Gingerbread Tree

It's finished! I really really hope that it is a hit at the charity auction. Is it weird that I would make something to give away and make money for someone else and yet not sell things to make money for myself? For some twisted reason it just feels right to give my creations away to people I care about. So Megan L, this one's for you!

Hopefully now everyone will understand why I called it the "Gingerbread Tree." 

Oh, and I didn't really mean to correlate cardinals with the world series, but life is funny like that. Honestly cardinals in a snow dusted tree just makes me feel a bit of Christmas magic. 

My intention was to avoid making the tree TOO Christmas-y since Thanksgiving will be the big holiday everyone is thinking about. Did I do OK? The green base was actually chosen because it echoed back to when my mom would receive trees with their root ball all tied up in a canvas material. I had some tan yarn, but the green just worked better. It also added more color interest. 

The base is filled with dried black beans. I knew I would be stretching the stitches, so I went with black to disguise the inevitable gaps. The tree is supported mainly by a coat hanger split among the main two branches. The smaller branches have pipe cleaners pulled through to help keep their shape.

Maybe next year I'll actually make things appropriate to the season. For the 4th of July I did a pumpkin... for October I've done an abominable snowman and a winter tree. Maybe my internal clock needs to be reset.

In any case have a wonderful Halloween weekend!