How to Make a Midcentury Retro Christmas Stocking

Hang this retro-inspired stocking by the chimney and old St. Nick won’t be able to resist filling it with all sorts of handmade midcentury and atomic goodies.

Using a large piece of butcher paper or other paper, draw your Christmas stocking shape. Use this as your pattern to cut out two stocking pieces (one left-facing and one right-facing stocking) from the white flannel, interior fabric and interfacing. Iron interfacing to wrong side of the exterior fabric as per manufacturer instructions.

Use scrap pieces from the butcher paper to draw ornament shapes and use them as patterns for cutting out the felt ornaments. Cut four little diamonds out of remaining felt pieces. Pin the ornament pieces to the stocking and sew to the stocking using a sewing machine or coordinating embroidery floss.

Use the fabric pen to mark additional starburst embroidery on the stocking, and add glass seed beads to the center of the starburst patterns as they are being embroidered within the ornaments and around the felt diamond pieces.

From the interior fabric, cut a rectangle of 4” x 8”. Iron it in half lengthwise to create a center crease, open it up and iron the lengthwise sides in so they meet at the center crease. Fold lengthwise one more time and iron again. Sew close to the edge on both long sides, creating a double-folded strip.

With right sides together, sew the exterior fleece stocking pieces together, leaving the top open. Do the same for the interior pieces, but leave a 4-inch opening along the side for turning later. (All seam allowances are ½” unless otherwise stated.)

With scissors, clip and notch the stocking’s curves so it will lay flat when it is turned right-side out. Turn the interior lining stocking right-side out and press. Fold the hanging tab in half and pin to the exterior stocking pieces at the back seam so that the raw edges line up. Insert the lining (right-side out) into the exterior stocking (wrong-side out) and pin along the top edge. Sew the stockings together along the top edge.

Pull the exterior of the stocking all the way out through the opening left in the lining. Sew the opening shut with a top-stitch very close to the edge of the fabric.