Your thoughts on Christmas tree skirts?

I made one for DMIL when I was first quilting. It was a Quilt in a Day pattern for a diamond log cabin. I bought enough fabric to make two! The first one was so large that it would have taken over her whole living room floor, so I finished it as a tablecloth for my round table! I then sized the starting diamond and the strips smaller, and made the one for her tree. It is still in use, many years later. When we bought our home in Florida, we decided to use a small tabletop tree. I still had some of the fabric left, so I made a much smaller one. Just put it away a few days ago!

Susan quilt> I have not made one but I'm of the school of thought that they are used

Awesome idea Pati! Any pics? :-)

Michelle in Nevada

The one that I have was made for my Mom many, many years ago from my SIL. I don't really care for it but I can't seem to part with it.

Will have to try and get some....... Pati, in Phx

Myf avourite story abour Christmas ree Skirts comes from the t.v. series "Designing Women". Do you remember it?

Alice Ghostley, the odd, funny "old" woman on the show came into the room one day WEARING a Christmas tree skirt. Loved it!

I just hide the tree base with a yard or two of Christmas themed fabric. Looks fine and a lot less work.

Lynne > Between the wedding and Christmas goings on, I never did wrap gifts; just

That's what I've done for over 30 years...just used a pretty holiday red plaid that had a gold metallic thread in it and scrunched it up around the base of the tree. However a couple years ago I bought a cute fleece one with appliques of sledding penguins (or something like that...) and embroidered with "Let it Snow". I've never felt the need for a fancy tree skirt...I guess it just wasn't something my family valued/cherished....whatever the word might be. We didn't have one and it wasn't a priority. So I'm not much help as to what to make. Love the Designing Women memory. That was a funny show!

Polly: Our tree goes up later than trees in many other homes, so we start stacking gifts under it right away, thus no one sees much of the skirt. We use a real tree and when we water it, sometimes we water the skirt too. For these reasons, I made a plain and durable skirt several years ago.

I cut a circle of 'pre-quilted' fabric with snow man motif. I lined it with a green holiday print, using a stitch and turn technique instead of binding it. I have a slit on the side to access the water reservoir. There are a few ribbons to tie the skirt closed. I added some bows of red ribbons to 'tack' it when I made same skirt for DS & DIL, but never got around to tacking the one here. These skirts wash up well and look good.

HTH. Pat in Virginia

Howdy!

...aside from the skirt, what is MaryJo wearing on her ears?!!!?

R/Sandy - no skirts in my house ;-P

I have a beautiful one with the 12 days of Christmas (machine) embroidered on each wedge. My DSis made it for me 10 yrs ago for my

1st Christmas in my own home. I just had it cleaned and packed away. I do use an old quilt for the "kids" tree on the porch. Homemade ornaments and "popcorn" garland, colored lights.

amy in CNY

It was the 80's!!! I still have some earrings stashed somewhere that are about that size! And what was she hiding under her jacket on her shoulders??? Did we think we looked good with those football pads?? Thank you Alexis Carrington. :-P

I found a log cabin skirt over at BOMQuilts.com. I'm not going to do this one in the 'courthouse' manner but at least BOM gave me a good starting place. Last night I fussy cut 24 tiny squares of The Grinch to go beside the beginning red square. Hummed 'Na Tum Do Ray' the whole time. DD will love it. Polly

Hi Polly,

I made a tree skirt a couple of years ago. I understand what you're saying about covering them up. I got around that this year by putting the presents under a nearby side table and leaving my tree skirt displayed. Worked for me. :-) There are pictures of my skirt with the tree on page two of this album

and the skirt by itself on the first page of this one I looked at an online pattern I'd found years ago and used that as a size guide, then substituted my bear pattern. It didn't take me too long, looks both simple and complicated and is quite durable so will stand up to anything even if it does have stuff dumped all over it (which it did the first year).

Go for it and make them to suit the recipients. They can then decide how much they cover it up. They were begging, after all. :-)

PS Keeping warm is not the problem here - it's keeping cool. We're heading up to 42C by Sunday...