Happy Christmas!

One Surprise

(And I hope you have many more!)

Gift Wrap

Wrapping presents is my favorite part of Christmas.  Seriously, I love, love, love making boxes pretty, and while store-bought giftwrap can be very nice looking, I prefer to use things I already have. Well, I am also a complete cheapskate.

We've gotten a few boxes this season filled with brown paper stuffing.  I always love it when we get packages filled with brown paper because it has so many possibilities.  I can reuse it as stuffing,  or for making sewing patterns (which I do very, very rarely), or, best yet, wrapping paper.  I just got a pretty damask style stamping set, so I'll show you how to take crumpled brown paper and turn it into an old style-looking fancy wrapping:

I usually iron the paper before I use it.  It keeps the wrinkled-ness of the paper, but it also allows it to lay flat. I have a cheap, cheap iron that doesn't actually get hot, so its always on the hottest setting and won't burn anything, but I would recommend using a lower setting than you think you need and see how it goes from there.  But look at what a difference it makes!

Once it's flat and ironed, just stamp away.

I finished mine off with a cream cotton yarn, a pom pom bow, and a stamped chipboard tag:

Since ribbon can be so expensive, and I have a way-too-big-for-my-own-good stash of yarn, I've been finding alternate bow-tying material.  I've fallen in love with pom poms.  I also collect boxes throughout the year (I can't throw anything away) for potential present wrappers.  The below gift doesn't actually contain tea, but I love the twinings tea tins, and am amassing a quantity greater than what I use.

If you have a hard time tying a beautiful bow, you could always draw the ribbon:

But my favorite are the crochet motif toppers. Way, way better than those sticky bows you buy at the store and they only take about about 5 minutes to create.  And they make great tree ornaments, pins, or they can be reused as gift bows.  I have a box of little motifs, whether they be mistakes, or the wrong gauge, or I started something and then got bored with it.

Presents

I made these for my 10 year old cousin. . . They are totally unlike any other jewelry we make, but I really love them, and they were so much fun to put together. Everything was made with repurposed pieces, most of which came from samples that I got at my old job. I liked them all, but had no idea what I would use them for. . . But I'm happy with all these pieces. Hopefully she will be too. (although I really want to keep the earrings for myself!)