Black and white is Christmas too.

My husband Rod is allergic to fir trees. Since we found this out, we've not had a live Christmas tree. Just as well there's no tree this year as the kittens would make short work of it! But last winter I got out an old wool quilt project and finished it. It was fun couching shiny black rat tail cord over the piece sketchbook-style following a chalked 'doodle tree' outline.

This year Doodle Tree is our Christmas tree and that's fine. I think black and white with warm red is a wonderful holiday color scheme. The black, white and gray wools were all old suiting samples. I remember the guy at the custom tailor shop in Lansing, Michigan had bagged up his older samples and was slinging them, bag upon bag, into the dumpster. One of the bags burst open and I saw the wools and asked, "Are all those bags wool samples?" He replied, "Yes-my Mom used to make quilts but she passed away and now nobody wants them." Tell me, how could I not take the stuff home?

He filled the back of my Toyota pick-up with the bags and they moved with me to North Carolina. Aside from the red wool borders and rat tail cord, all the elements of Doodle Tree are from those wool samples. I love quilting on wool. You can use bigger stitches (I quilted with black carpet thread) since the stitches tend to sink into the material if they're too small.

The Doddle Tree quilt was finished with black binding and I hung it on the wall this year. If you click the star detail you can see the black quilting stitches close up.

Merry Christmas and happy quilting to you all.