Christmas Gifts 2012

Yes, the title is Christmas Gifts 2012. As I am planning the gifts I will make for 2013, I realized I never posted the gifts I made last Christmas. Oops. And I did not remember until a friend of mine invited me to a "craft day." I responded that I am not really that crafty, to which she pulled out the gifts I made last year. So, maybe I am crafty.

Just like millions of American women, my inspiration comes from Pinterest. I stumbled on these necklaces and these glasses and thus I knew what I wanted to make.

CANDLE VOTIVES
I made these for my son's teacher and they were extremely easy!

I found some great glasses at the dollar bins at Target. I have lots of glass paint (from 10 years ago when I made a bunch of votives for Christmas... again, forgot I can be crafty), but the paint can be found at any craft store. For a picture of the paint I use, refer to this blog post.

I squeezed the paint onto a paper plate and used the flat end of a bamboo skewer to put dots all around the glass, making them more dense towards the bottom. I was proud of the end result!

GLASS PENDANTS

This project was a bit more time intensive, but I loved how I could make each one unique. Instead of square glass, I used the round stones found in the floral section of the craft store.

I wandered the scrapbook paper section for a while to find the perfect papers. I wanted paper with  "words" and paper with "music" for my project, and I also printed my own graphics. I used the stones to trace circles to fit perfectly.

I used modge podge to attach the circles to the stones, let them dry, then used modge podge to seal the back of the paper to the stones. Once that dried, I attached magnets to some, and necklace/keychain loops to others, using really strong epoxy. The most time intensive part of the entire project was waiting for "dry time."

So now that I have finally shared my gifts from last year, I can start gathering materials for the gifts for this year. Happy crafting!

Gifts at the Circus

I have felt a week behind since Thanksgiving.

I'm not sure whether I slept through an entire week and missed it, or just zoned out and drifted through a week in a fog. Either way, all of my activities were behind schedule: selecting & purchasing gifts, getting & decorating the tree, baking treats, and wrapping gifts. Since I've been incorporating more "green" living in my life over the past 10 years, I planned some of my gifts to be consumable or to be made from re-purposed items.

The first task was baking treats. I love to bake, and the holidays give me an excuse to bake lots of treats and give them as gifts and not eat them all myself. So I spent one weekend doing a lot of baking.

These treats are yummy! From my oven to your tummy!

Starting at "noon" on the plate the treats are: Hazelnut Thumbprints, Cinnamon Almond Brittle, Triple Chocolate Peppermint Brownies, Pecan Bars, Peppermint Drops, Stripes, and Sugarplums (in the center of the plate). The bread is Bananas Foster with a Rum Glaze. Delicious!! One of my treat gift recipients dove right in to the bag of treats and started with a brownie; he proceeded to make sounds that I am sure only his wife should hear!!!! Perhaps the brownies need a new title... If you would like any of the recipes, just leave me a comment and your email :)

Anyway, the next task was an item for the Book Club Gift Exchange. The guidelines: the gift cannot cost more that $5 and should contain something made by the giver. Since the Club is a Recipe Club (we cook/bake something inspired by the book to bring to the meeting and we share the recipe), I ruled out my treats. Instead, I remembered a crafty thing I really enjoyed a few years ago: Stained Glass.

I searched my arts & crafts bins to see if I still had any of my supplies. I was pretty shocked by how much I had stashed away:

I purchased glasses from the thrift store for a total of $1.88.

I decided to do a geometric design for the glasses, using straight lines for the 2 similar glasses and circles for the different glass. I painted the lines free-hand using the black leading paint.

After allowing time for the leading to dry, I began adding color in the shapes created by the intersecting leading lines. The paint is somewhat opaque and cloudy when wet but then dries to a much more "clear" finish.

I included 3 tea lights and my gift was complete!! Since we planned a "Dirty Santa" gift exchange, I had no idea who would receive my gift. The recipient seemed very pleased and I'm hoping her reaction was legit and not just a way to cover her plan to hide them on a closet shelf once she got home.

I was so pleased with these glasses that I painted empty jars (from salad dressing) for 2 friends. They were also pleased, and a bit amazed that I painted them. Seriously, it is incredibly easy!

Now to turn my sights to 2012. I have learned to expect the unexpected (especially in my house!!), so I look forward to whatever the future may hold.

I am not one to make resolutions just because of the date on the calendar. Every day is a good day for making a change, whether to better yourself, better your community, or better the world!