Stockings were hung - and made - with care

If you happen to pass Dallas Draper's home in Melrose on Christmas Eve, and notice that Santa's sled has been parked outside long enough that the reindeer are stomping with impatience, well, you should know there is a good reason.

The jolly old elf will have 49 - count 'em - 49 stockings to take care of once he squeezes down the chimney. It could take a while.

Those rows of hand-quilted, personalized stockings represent every member of Draper's extended family -- children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and assorted spouses, plus one for her and one for her late husband.

It's a holiday display that has grown almost every year since she stitched the first ones 17 Christmases ago.

It started for a simple reason: "I got tired of the plain red stockings you see at Christmas, and decided to individualize them," Draper said.

She started with six, one for each member of her immediate family.

One son was a hunter, another an enthusiastic fan of the San Francisco 49ers football team, and the third was in the United States Marine Corps. Their stockings were decorated accordingly.

"My daughter liked everything, so hers is a blend," Draper said.

The two she stitched for herself and her husband - Nan and Granddad, to the grandchildren - represented their own interests, sewing for her and golf for him.

Draper's husband, Jack, died in 2019, but his stocking and a large portrait of him remain a central part of the display.

The collection goes up every Thanksgiving Day and adorns Draper's living room until January or sometimes even early February, she said, before being packed away to wait for Santa's next visit.

This talented seamstress got her start as a sixth grader when she wanted a new dress for Easter. She is one of eight siblings in her family.

"My mother said, 'If you want a new dress, you'll have to make it yourself,'" she recalled.

After she married, her mother-in-law taught her to quilt, a skill she uses almost daily both in doing projects for others and as a long-time member of the Melrose quilting club.

The decorations on the stockings run the gamut - everything from birdhouses to horses, and tools to weathervanes, plus a smattering of sports mascots and logos.

They are crafted from all manner of meaningful fabric ... bits of wedding quilts, recycled childhood clothing, salvaged sections of beloved baby blankets.

These days, as new babies are added to her family, Draper said she makes a blanket for each arrival and tailors a stocking from the remnants of the same fabric to match it. The owner's name is stitched on the cuff, along with the date of construction.

Her newest stocking - which will be number 50, by my count - has already been made for a wee one due to arrive in January, but "it's not hanging yet," Draper said. "They haven't told me his name."

Draper filled all the stockings once, a few years back.

"I thought the kids were going to tear them apart," she said with a chuckle, "so they are just decorations now."

Maybe so, but just in case Santa thinks otherwise, you'd better hope he comes to your house before he lands on Draper's roof.

He may be so charmed by this collection that he'll empty his sleigh right here.

And I, for one, wouldn't blame him a bit.

Betty Williamson wishes you a full stocking, even if it's a plain old red one. Reach her at:

[email protected]