12 Styled Days of Christmas & Stocking DIY

You might of guessed already but I’ll shout it from the rooftops anyway. I love Christmas! I love twinkling lights, warm drinks, treating yourself to those little indulgent treats you would usually feel guilty about and most of all, I love how merry and happy people are around this time. So you can imagine how delighted I was when Teri from The Lovely Draw asked me to work with 11 other amazing, Christmas obsessed bloggers and West Elm to create a 12 day styling marathon of beautiful tabletops based on our favourite festive traditions.

I chose my favourite part of Christmas day. Breakfast!

Christmas morning has always been my favourite time. Waking up as a child and realising the big day is here. Running to the window to check if it’s snowed and sitting on my bed with my sister opening our stockings. Each year Father Christmas bought us the same thing, which instead of being repetitive actually made unwrapping so much more fun. It was essential that the stocking included an apple, an orange, chocolate money, new (shiny!) coins, a calendar, a tube of sweets and a few surprise treats thrown in for good measure.

As an adult Santa no longer brings the stockings… but Christmas mornings are still just as exciting. We make it really relaxed and indulgent before getting swept up in the business of the day! With help from West Elm, this year will be extra special. I’m bringing the stockings back! With fun games, delicious candles and on point ornaments (get that gold hashtag!!) our stockings are going to be amazing. It’s going to be hard to make sure we leave enough room in them for that list of essential items!

I still have my stocking from childhood. It’s yellow and covered in what I used to think was corn. My mum made the stocking for my first Christmas and I could never replace it! But Alex does not have one. So of course I whip out the sewing machine to correct this. I’ve used some of the gorgeous fabrics I had left over from this post from This Little Streets California Dreaming collection to make this contemporary, pattern block stocking.

1. Draw out your template. If you have another stocking use this as a guide. Just remember not to make the toe area too narrow!
2. Cut out your main fabric using the template. After cutting out one side of the stocking turn the template over onto the opposite side before cutting out the other.
3. From your second fabric cut two rectangles the same width as the top of the stocking and 2-3 inches tall.
4. Place the rectangle and the stocking together with the rectangle underneath and stocking over the top. Sew them together along the top of the stocking. Make sure the pattern on both pieces of fabric are facing towards you when you do this. You should now be able to flip the rectangle over the top of the stocking. Sew a small hem along the raw long side of the rectangle to keep it neat.
5. Once you have repeated step four for both sides of the stocking lay the pieces out flat and put together with the patterns on the rectangular pieces facing each other. Sew together along the sides of JUST the rectangle at this point.
6. Turn the whole stocking inside out so that the main stocking pieces have the patterned sides facing each other and sew all around the edge of JUST the stocking pieces.

Turn inside out again and fold over the rectangle fabric and VOILA, your stocking is made! Now its time to fill it with treats.

More than anything I’m looking forward to opening our stockings together over a big plate of vegan french toast this Christmas morning. You can follow along with Front + Main and the hashtags #mywestelm and #kindredspirits to see the other bloggers favourite Christmas traditions and beautiful tables! And trust me (I’ve already seen them), they are full of creativity and gorgeous ideas for your own table this year. Don’t miss them!