Christmas Teddy Bear Diamond Painting Kit

The best part was never the morning. It was the night before it, lying awake listening to the house go quiet, convinced that something was happening downstairs without you.

This diamond painting kit holds that hour still. A teddy bear keeps watch by the tree with candy canes hooked over the branches, presents pushed underneath and stars scattered above. The palette is unusual for a Christmas scene: soft blues do nearly all the background work, so the warm reds and the candlelight tones become the only heat in the room. Everything sits dim except the things that ought to glow.

Twenty-one DMC colors beginning at 318, a pale gray-blue, is what makes night look like night rather than navy. The blue range is where almost all the shading happens, and it is the reason the lit parts land quietly instead of shouting. A thinner palette would give you one blue for the whole dark half of the canvas and let the tree do the rest.

The details

• 45 x 45 cm (18 x 18 in)
• Full coverage, round drills
• 21 DMC colors, DMC 318 to DMC 3865
• Adhesive canvas printed with clear symbols and a color legend
• Sealed, numbered, DMC color-coded drill packets
• Diamond stylus pen, grooved tray, wax refill and tweezers

Straight talk

Roughly 25 to 30 hours of placing, so treat it as a project and not a weekend. A word on the darker blues: several sit close together, so keep the packets sealed until each one comes up and work symbol by symbol rather than filling a background from memory. Round drills, full coverage, canvas rolled in the tube. No frame.

Hang it where you pass at night with the lights off, and the waiting stays available all year round.