This weekend was a big craft push for me. I sewed pillows, aprons, and bags. I strained infused oils made from garden herbs and turned them into hand salve, and I also worked on some embroidery. It wasn't so much a relaxing weekend as it was a furiously productive one, but I feel relieved to have a good number of my handmade presents ready for wrapping.
Last year, 25 percent of you told me that you were making holiday gifts. That's a pretty big number! This year, are you doing the same? If you've never made handmade gifts in the past, are you doing so this year? Tell me about all of the projects that you have in the works, that you hope to still start, and which ones you've finished. Anyone have a brilliant idea for last-minute craft projects? Share them with the rest of us in the comments!
Open House: Handmade Presents For the Holidays
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1Wow, I want to be your friend!
I'm not patient enough to make gifts, but I absolutely love receiving homemade gifts.
2This is my first year "handmaking" a gift. I am making cranberry liquor. I'm on day 5 of a 10 day process. My husband is making truffles for my neice.
3niece : )
4i love making things for people. my mother has always done that and i think it's just in my blood. :}
5I looooove handmade gifts. To me, they can be very endearing and charming.
6I love taking some of the standards such as photo albums as gifts and jazzing them up. Like making an out of the ordinary album, with crazy layouts and background pages with fun colors. Or getting a collection of frames for under $20 and creating some great prints with Photoshop for everyone in my family. Also, a trip to the thrift store can give you some great things to fix up a bit for very little money and give unique gifts to everyone! And never underestimate the value of a homemade card--they mean so much more to people than a store bought one. =)
7yup. all handmade this year.
8My parents requested only handmade this year, so for my mom, I'm recovering some fabulous lounge chairs that she's had for ages. As for my dad, I'm sewing rolls for his screwdriver collection, which currently lives in a cardboard box, circa 1980. I'm also planning on making handmade cards for everyone, but time's ticking on that one! Oh, and several friends are getting handmade additions to store bought gifts - I make a coconut oil/sugar scrub that's fabulous, (if I do say so myself!) and I'm printing mini-desk calendars, too! And here's one more - for a friend's recent birthday, I made personalized stationary, by adding home made letterhead to a box of blank notecards, and including a set of return-address labels as well! Yay for handmade!
9mletrav - are you willing to give up the recipe for this aweomse coconut scrub? Sounds like a winner to me!
10I'm on crafty mode right now! I made about 8 scarves for people, I'm making lavender sleep masks too. I also put together mugs for my boyfriends co workers, with $1 mugs from michaels or the 99cent store and fill them with hot coco, candies etc. I made my niece a socktapus which was super cute. I also printed out calendars for some people of my dog, which is kidn of a joke but I know they'll like them. I love getting ideas for handmade gifts, all year long! Is there a handmade gift group yet?? If not we should start one!
I usually make loads of different things for gifts, but this year I'm not feeling very inspired
The only thing we'll be doing is making book "thongs" for my daughters teachers. (Sounds racy but its not!) They're a piece of leather cord with pretty beads and semi-precious stones
strung on each end, creating a bookmark. Its jewelry for your books! We made them a few years ago, and the teachers loved them so my daughter wants to make them again.
11I'm doing homemade gifts for most of the kids in my life.
My 2 month old niece is getting a embroidered bib, and her 2 year old brother is getting alphabet flash cards with pictures of his family where appropriate (for example: "D is for Daddy") and pictures from magazines for the other letters.
I'm doing a lot of decoupage. My 15 year old sister is getting a mirror with a decorated frame, my 10 year old brother is getting a treasure box with pictures of his favorite pro-wrestlers on it, and my 6 year old sister is getting a Curious George bank. My husband's 1 year old nephew is getting a board book of all the primary and secondary colors made with pictures from magazines. His 11 & 8 year old nieces are getting jewelry boxes decorated with scrapbook paper.
There are more people who should be getting gifts, but I don't think I'm going to have enough time to get to them all by Christmas.
12Renee3 - it's nothing fancy at - just coconut oil and raw sugar, mixed into a paste. The best part, though, is that coconut oil has a really low melting point, so when you use it, it melts into your skin! I like to use it in the shower, so some of the residual oil washes off with the sugar.
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