With less than a month until Christmas, our family has started getting some of our favorite traditions ready.  Decorations are coming out, we're choosing recipes for holiday goodies, and we're getting our countdown Advent Calendars ready.  

One of the most anticipated Christmas advent traditions in our house is our nightly selection of story books.  When our teeth are brushed and our favorite Pjs are on (those being Simcoe PJs, of course!), 24 of our favorite picture books are waiting to be read.  For the past 4 years, we've collected a selection of seasonal stories that touch our hearts, and we read one together every night from December 1st until Christmas Eve.  Each night, one child chooses a book... but which story it is is always a surprise!  Every book has been wrapped in it's very own fabric bag (and no peeking allowed!).  

This is the time of year when I want to sew ALL the pajamas!  Flannel and fleece are both on sale and our family has already seen the first snow flurries of the season outside our windows.  I know other people are also thinking about sewing up Christmas pajamas for their families, and I got thinking 'Hey, wouldn't it be great if someone made a huge list of PJ patterns so people could browse through to find the perfect one?'  Then I realized... I'm someone!  I already had a pretty big list of pattern options I liked for my own family, all I needed to do was organize it and find more.  So... the pajama pattern hunt began...

My list grew from big... to huge... to EPIC!  In this post, you will find over 80 patterns for the whole family in every style and fabric you could hope for!  Pajama party time!

~~~ Updated September 22, 2020, with MORE PJs patterns released within the last year! ~~~

Ah, the wonders of bias tape!  Perfectly coordinated clean edges flowing smoothly around curves and adding that perfect finished touch.  What is it that makes bias tape such an ideal alternative to a turned hem, and how can you make your own so that it is truly a perfect pairing with your project?  Read on, my sewing friend, because homemade bias tape may just become one of your new favorite things!

One of the things I enjoy about designing is the ability to take inspiration from something you see and figure out a way to use it for your own vision of a pattern.  I was recently inspired to use color-blocking and buttons to create a new Muskoka tunic.  I wanted to give you a closer look and share some tips on how you might do something similar.

Sometimes a quick craft is just the thing to get you in a festive mood.  I wanted to add something new to our Christmas tree this year, and stumbled across a few different ideas for using cinnamon sticks (of which I have a lot) to make Christmas ornaments.  While my first few attempts resulted in utter failure (apparently I am not particularly good at cutting cinnamon sticks without breaking them... nor at making a star that looks star-shaped), I finally found a triangle ornament by Tag & Tibby that I thought was simple and charming. 

As soon as I glued my first cinnamon sticks into the triangle shape... my eye fell onto the remnants of my failed attempts to cut cinnamon sticks into tiers, and INSPIRATION struck!  All my triangle needed was a "trunk", and it was a perfect Christmas tree.