Bevanger,
I asked at JoAnns because I thought that they marked down earlier than I remember in years past. They said yes, they did get the OK to mark down early this year and that they normally do not have 60% off Christmas fabrics until after Christmas but so many people were making items for others this year.
A friend told me that this was planned in advance because the company that makes the fliers for the paper do so months if not a year in advance. So who knows, but for whatever reason they have been on sale for a while now. I picked up quite a variety of really pretty pointsettas and a couple others just this past week and used a gift card so it cost me next to nothing. Good luck finding some great stuff.