I just finished the Christmas stocking for my new daughter in law. It's an applique and stuff felt stocking (next year I take the class on knitting one) with a foresty type Santa walking along with a tree over his shoulder. It's very busy but lovely colors and no sequins, just a few red beads. While I was working on it my son told me that his wife was thinking about converting (from what I'm not sure) to Buddhism. Happy that she has a higher power in any form, I googled for the words Catholic and Buddha and came up with an Indonesian saint who is the Buddha. It had a lovely and simple image so I cut out some felt and appliqued him to the back of the stocking.
I'm now working on the stocking for my new son in law. It's a big happy santa (Buddha?) - mostly beard and hat with lots of sequins.
After that, I'm going to start making teddy bears. I have a wonderful pattern in a quilting magazine.
I understand...I tried to get one of my kids who is way too goth and into dark stuff interested in Bushido at least from the martial arts/honor code/discipline side. Didn't work. But I think at this point he's being too lazy and too busy trying to stay afloat doing the absolute minimum of work that at least he's not getting into deeper trouble (I hope. He doesn't even call home much, and his phone's been disconnected cause he didn't pay the bill...)
There is a Zen Buddhist guy, who used to carry around a big bag of treats to hand out to kids, much in a similar mode to Santa Claus. Not a bad figure to use if the idea comes up again.
This gave me a good chuckle. :-)
What neat gifts for your new son and daughter in-laws! The one for your daughter in-law sounds really pretty.