A homemade Christmas

Ok now that Christmas is over I can post all the homemade Christmas presents I made this year.  I love making homemade gifts and pinterest has made collecting ideas for projects so much more fun.  Above is the Cross stitch of the Seattle Temple.  This is for my sister in law and her husband, they were married there in 2009.  I covered up the part below the temple, becasue it has their full name and marriage date.

                     

                   

This butterfly mobile is to go in my nieces room.

These cute little shoes, are for my soon to be new nephew :)

This Heads and tails  game is to go in the girls busy bag.

Pillow case nightgowns made from pillow cases I got at goodwill.

Make your own Monsters, for my little monsters

Old McDonald Puppets for the girls

Button snake for the busy bag

Busy bags with all the gear.  If you are looking for busy bag ideas click HERE for my previous post with links to all the ideas. 

Fat Quarter dresses for the girls.  Blue and pink for Claire, and Pink and Brown for Violet

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Glittery letters

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Hers are covered in scrapbook paper, I wanted mine to be sparkly.  I just painted and sprinkled glitter on top while the paint was still wet...you can spray a sealer on if you like but mine didn't really need it (I'll probably need to "re glitter" them next year because of that though).

                                                                  The ruffle tree skirt

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Dried oranges for tree ornaments

I love the way these look on the tree.  The light shines through and it sparkles a pretty golden color.

dried cinnamon and apple sauce ornaments.  These smell heavenly and look cute on the tree.  Mine are made with mini cookie cutters, so the recipe made like 30 or 40 of them, plus a small blob of dough the girls could play with till it hardened.

 A ruffle scarf for my mom. Next time I make this I won't dye the fabric.  The process was messy and I wasn't happy with how it made the fabric feel in the end.

 2 little mermaids for the girls....they love them by the way :)

 Bread and Butter as a Christmas treat for my family and friends.

 Overall I had a lot of fun doing a homemade christmas this year.  If you don't enjoy doing homemade crafts I suggest going a different route because it is a lot of work and a lot of pre-planning.  I like to plan way ahead and I usually start seriously planning Christmas in september when all our summer traveling is wrapped up, and I started making stuff in September and I was busy with some stage of the crafting process all the way up until December 17th!

 Oh and last but not least my ultra secret project for Peter.  A Padded headboard!  Here is another Link on making your own headboard.  I'll do a more detailed post on the Saga of the headboard later but let me just say this is not a project for sissies...It involves lots of physical labor, table saws, power drills, giant needles, and lots of hammering!  It was fun.

 Now we've just got to get it out of my parents storage room and into my apartment.

 Thanks to my Dad for helping me for the last 2 months to put this thing together!

So if you are thinking of doing a homemade Christmas (in 2012 or beyond) my tips would be to:

1. Plan WAY ahead!- make a list of who you want to do gifts for or what decorations you want to make (I plan to start thinking about next year no later than March)

2. Sign up to get coupons from your local craft store- this stuff can all get pretty pricey!

3. Read through your instructions before you go shopping for supplies, you may find you need more than you planned

4. Shop for your materials before the Holiday rush...there is nothing worse than being stuck at the fabric counter at any point in the months of October, November, or Heaven help you if you try to go in December.  Crafters start crafting early so think ahead and get there even earlier! (the early bird gets to shop in peace)

5. Prioritize-What's going to take the longest? for me it was the headboard so I set aside time to work on it each week at my parents house, it took about 8 weeks of slow and steady work.

6. If you don't like to do this kind of stuff....don't do it.  It saves a little bit of money but not so much that it is worth torturing yourself.  I happen to enjoy making the things I did so it worked great for me, but if you would rather just hit the mall...go...do it...It's supposed to be a MERRY time of year :)

7. Set an "end of crafting" day at least 3 or 4 days before the holiday (if you cook, entertain or bake for the holidays, give yourself a break and quit the crafts at least a week in advance).  There is always something else that can be made, there are so many cute decorations to put up, but at some point you just have to say  I'm DONE and enjoy the holiday.

I hope you all had a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays.

Happy New Year!

oh....and check out this cute little puppy that is joining our family in a couple weeks...I'm so excited!

 o

2 little Mermaids

2 Little Mermaids have joined the ranks of Christmas gifts for the girls.  They have yet to be wrapped so they are hiding in my closet.  I have one blond daughter and one red headed daughter so they each got a doll that matched them. I used all left over fabric from my mom's fabric bins so this project was practically free! yay!
I found this pattern over at the Crafting Fiend.  It is a free Pdf download, the only part that didn't come up in the download was the body so I just made a long trapezoid that was the same width of the neck and not as wide as the tail width pre-smocked and I think the length was about 6 inches.   Their necks seem a bit long to me so I'm thinking of making a little necklace for them...what do you think?

The most exciting part of all?  This is my last sewing project of the year and my final gift for the girls!  After today I will be almost done baking my bread  and then I just have to finish Peter's top secret gift, and one quick gift for my mother in law and then I can just relax until Christmas!

old McDonald had a farm....

They are done!

The first step was to cut all the pieces out, (that took an entire night!  Don't underestimate how long it will take to cut out 16 tiny black eyes....I think I've used as much felt as I can stand for at least a year....dang I have one more small felt project for Christmas)

 then to glue the pieces to the body (Hint...just hot glue in the middle of the pieces, trying to sew through hot glue is impossible!)

and then to embroider around those parts ( I had a lot of embroidery thread in the appropriate colors so I only had to buy a few new colors, but they are only 30 cents each)

 and then sew it all together! ( my sewing machine was not happy with me about this part.  Sewing felt can make for a lot of fuzz in your sewing machine so keep a little brush handy to clean out the needle and little gripper teeth often or your machine will jam...A LOT)



  Here is the original pattern for the puppets.  They take about a week of nightly work but I think they are so cute  and the girls will love them so they are worth the effort.

 aren't they cute?  My favorites are the little lamb

  and the kitty.

Baby booties

I'm getting a new nephew in February. I'm so excited I just had to try this pattern for baby booties that I have had forever and have not had a reason to use for a long time ( well I suppose I could have made some for the two nieces that were born last year....sorry girls!)

I was actually surprised at how simple these are to make.  I am not a great seamstress so anything that comes together  and looks nice I'm happy with.   My favorite part is the airplane buttons.  My brother in law flies airplanes so I was pretty psyched when I found those buttons.

I know how to sew now!

Look what I made!  I am so proud!  It's a nightgown made from a pillow case!  A PILLOW CASE!  ok so It's not that complicated but I'm not a great seamstress so I am excited that they look cute and haven't fallen apart yet.  I made six...Violet and I got a little carried away at Goodwill picking out pillow cases.  Each night gown takes about  1-2 hours.   You will need pins...lots of pins!

Here is the pattern in case you want to try it out :)