Candle tea party

I haven't gotten all the things done that I hoped on the weekend, but today I finally made the teacup candles that I saw in Martha Stewart's magazine last year!

I picked the teacups up at yard sales this summer and cut store-bought cafe candles to the right size because I didn't have any place to buy wicks around here. These candles were about $4.00 for a box of 20, I think. Then, I melted the remainder of the cut candle , along with ends of scented pillar candles, in a 9" pie plate over a pot of boiling water. I poured the melted wax in the cup around the candle and added a teabag tag with a heart stamped on it. I will give these to pre-school teachers for Christmas.

The wheels are in motion!

Well, I cut my Christmas card list unmercilessly this year and they are addressed and waiting for pictures. Maybe I can take the Christmas picture this weekend...
I also did the home spruce up worksheet from organized Christmas. I would really like to complete something on that sheet this week! Guess I'll start with finishing the paint in the boy's room. I'll have to post before and afters , as DH did a fabulous job building a bed in the eaves for DS8. I need to oil the wood on the bed, too! Sheesh-forgot about that! I'd love to do a Suessical, Mount Crumpet/Whoville theme for Christmas in there. I'll have to see what I can come up with.
I've got to do a bit more digging in the storage space, as there are a few gifts I've bought and just stuffed in there!(Not good!)
To Do(Weekend edition!)

1. stitch snowflakes on apron
2. take Christmas card photo
3. paint in boys room
4. take Christmas totes out of storage, put summer totes in storage, put Christmas totes back in storage!Phew!

I'll let you know how I make out! Happy Weekend!

Okay, so I didn't quite FINALIZE my craft list. I got hyperfocused on my gift tote and ended up wrapping one gift! One down! Anywho... I'm classifying anything I have to make as a craft!
Here's something tentative...(I'm so lucky my hubby can build things, too!)

1. Christmas cookies gift 'basket'. This consists of a metal lunchbox I have to alter with "born to shop, forced to cook" saying on it; recipe cards scrapped with family favorites on them; a store bought apron with blue snoflakes stitched on it; and copper cookie cutters.
2. 2 crokinole boards(hubby)
3. recycle centre(hubby)
4. 2 bedpockets with books and flashlights
5. Lasagna wih garlic bread
6. Chili basket packed with western hat and bandana, veggie tales movie, french onion soup bowls, corn chips and chili of course!
7. Tree in a box-pine cone garland, pine cone carolers, tree topper, tree skirt, painted ornaments(rustic). Lights and tree stand.

That's it for now. I'm sure to add more baking as I finish these things up! Better get started!

Holiday Preparations

Today, I got together with my sister and niece and donned my 'Naughty or Nice' Christmas vest to start 'honest to goodness' preparations for that merry old time of the year! They got out their laptops and I got out the looseleaf and we collectively logged on to Organized Christmas to begin the Christmas Countdown, albeit, one week early. We gave ourselves a daily task this week in order to stay on track. My weekly list looks like this;

1. Monday- Talk to my spouse to find out what things he enjoyed most in past celebrations. This I did, and after a few strange looks(Christmas already?) I found out we agree that church service on Christmas Eve doesn't work for us, yet. (We need to give our youngest child a couple of more years)
2. Tuesday- Work on Master gift list and finalize a craft list.
3. Wednesday-Christmas card list (with addresses)
4. Thursday-Home Spruce up list. This could take more time than I've allotted...
5. Friday- inventory and gather card supplies
6. Saturday and Sunday- fine tune this week's work and prepare for next week.

I guess the Christmas bug is quite contagious, as I recieved an excited call from my niece, after she left. She had picked up a gift for my son and that was one more checkmark on her list! Way to Go!

Hope to post my craft list tomorrow evening! See you then!

Altered Clipboards

Here's how I did my clipboards-

What I used -

~clipboard

~old wrapping paper,wallpaper or scrapbook paper

~coordinating acrylic paint

~Matte mod podge

~cutter

~old christmas cards

~printed numbers, stickers or rub-ons

~washers

~glue

~sticky back magnets

~exacto knife and cutting board

~double sided tape

~container for numbers

~chipboard or wooden tags

~Coordinating fibers and/or ribbon

The first thing I did was paint the top of my clipboard with a coordinating color. This saves me from having to cut my paper all around the clip.
Then I clipped my background paper in the clipboard to hold it in place while I traced it on my clipboard. This makes cutting easier which is what I did next. I used my cutter, but you could easily use scissors.

Next I cut a background for my numbers to go on and I Mod Podged it to the clipboard. After that was semi-dry, I glued the washers to it with Tacky glue. Then I cut this snowman off an old Christmas card and podged him on to this clipboard. For the snowflake, I had been given some free cardstock die cuts from our local scrapbook store, so I podged that half on the board and cut off the bit hanging off the edge.

I had a sheet of 'Scenic Route' numbers,(that's just the brand name), so I podged them to some leftover pastebord (from some packaging for something, sometimes it helps to be a packrat) and cut them out, using scissors and an exacto knife. Then I cut and stuck my magnets to the back of the numbers. For the snowflake board I used wooden tags from the Dollar store and stuck some number cut-outs tags to them.

Then I took a rubber band and tied a whole bunch of fibers to it. This made it easy to wrap it around the clip.
Next I printed my sayings on the computer and mounted them on the board. For the snowman board I took my brown ink pad and sponge and just inked the edges of the sayings to 'dirty' them up a bit and make them look more rustic.

I found an empty plastic battery container and a tin peppermint container to use to hold the numbers. they weren't very pretty so I stuck some coordinating paper on the tin to use for the snowflake numbers and I printed a reindeer on sticker paper for the battery container. I inked this to go with the rustic look of the snowman board.

Day Late and a Dollar short

That's me-just a little behind the eight ball! Oh well! I got my clipboards done the day AFTER Rudy Day-but they are done and here they are. I'll post more instructions and pictures the week the craft is featured at MHH. Hope you like them!

Tomorrow's Rudolph Day...

but, I'm sorry, I just can't wait! The members at MHH are just too inspiring AND have too many fabulous ideas, therefore, I'm working on a bit of Christmas today!

Basket(one of the afore mentioned members) posted this link to some Christmas cards at Familyfun. I think this will be our design for 2008, as long as I can find the appropriate envelopes. I was looking through my craft stash of old Christmas cards (Throw them out?you've got to be kidding!) and I found one that read,'Hope you're all wrapped up in holiday fun!'. Hmmm...this led to me digging out last year's cheap Christmas paper. All I need now is alot of red ribbon and my poor little men are going to fall victim to yet another crazy photo op of Mom's staging! I'll post when I've got them sufficiently 'wrapped up in holiday fun!'
Okay-that leads to the shopping list~
1. Red ribbon(saunders in New Ross)
2. Envelopes
3. cording
4. shiny paper

Christmas Present!

Today I ordered in 2 copies of -The Mitten. I'm going to sew bed pockets for my kids and my younger niece & nephew, in the shape of mittens. I'll include a flashlight, a copy of the book and maybe a stuffed animal;(one that's in the book). I also want to sew some clothes for my niece's doll from some red velvet I have left over. I'm hoping I have enough for a cape as well!

One Week 'til Rudy Day!

Next Sunday, May 25th I'll be celebrating Rudolph Day with my neice and my sister. What to do?
I should really finalize my 'gift giving and crafting for gifts', lists. I think I'll also get my card list together and check out a picture location. Check out these Christmas Photos! So creative!
http://www.thriftyfun.com/tf988253.tip.html