Christmas stocking traditions have been around the world and back again. The story begins with a Turkish bishop named Nicholas, who, taking pity on three poor daughters that had hung their stockings to dry by the fire, filled those stockings with gold. The bishop became a saint, his name changed as his story traveled, and here in America it is Santa Claus who fills the stockings hung by the chimney with all sorts of gifts.

Those poor girls' stockings are now beautifully rendered handcrafts. Crossroads Trade has appliqued Russian stockings from home workshops in a variety of snowy scenes, Kyrgyz stockings from a women's co-op in felt with spiral designs, and Bolivian stockings, made by La Paz women who share a market stall, showing life in the altiplano.