Book Giveaway

 http://vanessies.blogspot.com/2010/12/book-give-away.html

Merry Christmas

 
Merry Christmas from my family to yours.

Memory Dolls

These two little guys are the last of my Christmas gift making. They are special because they are made in memory of my Grandpa who passed away January 2nd 2009.( I miss him so much) The dolls clothes are made from his shirts and pants. I made these dolls for two of my cousins. I've made 8 of these dolls so far and still have about 8 to go. It has taken me a while to get all these dolls made because it makes cry every time I think about my Grandpa. He was my rock and I feel very lost with out him. Anyway I am giving the dolls to my Grandma who will in turn give them to my cousins as a gift from her since she supplied the clothes.

What am I doing wrong?

I've been sharing several things lately but no one seems to like them I'm assuming because not one person has said so. Maybe I'm boring you if so speak up and say hey write something exciting.I know that I have a visitor or two. Please leave comments, so I know you liked your visit. Your comments let me know what to write about :) I don't know if you like my posts if you don't tell me . And it makes me so happy to read them, Thank you!!

Quick and easy gift bag tutorial

I made a few baked goods to give my friends for Christmas. I put them in clear cellophane bags but then I needed a bag to put all the goodies in. I goggled "Christmas treat bag containers" and several sites and ideas came up but there was nothing I really liked after viewing tons of links. Then an idea came to me. I can  make my own. But what could I use that was quick and easy? I wasn't really in the mood to sew and it would take more time than I had. So  I went on the hunt for supplies and I came across these brown lunch bags.Who doesn't have those bags lying around the kitchen? I knew I could figure out something to do with these bags and so here is what i cam up with.

                Quick and easy gift bag                                                
Items you will need: 

• brown lunch bags
• wrapping paper
• adhesive
• scissors
• decorated label
• ribbon (not shown) 
• hole punch (not shown) 

 To get started apply adhesive to front of bag

Place bag face down onto your wrapping paper.

Trim around bag but be careful not to cut your bag, you don't want your goodies falling out.(don't ask me how I know this)

once your bag is all trimmed, apply your pretty label

and fold the top of your bag to the back.

Next punch two holes in the top of the bag

Put your goodies in the bag,

 poke the ribbon through the holes and tie it shut.

 An inexpensive and easy to make gift bag. These bags make up in no time and you can make with your kids. You can use any kind of wrapping paper.

S' More Please

After seeing these handmade s' mores I just had to make one.

 I used some air dry clay for the marshmallow/snowman and polymer clay for the chocolate squares and graham cracker. He made up quickly but it does take sometime for the white to dry. I would have used polymer but I didn't have any white. I want to make s'more. Pun intended.

Last Minute Gift Ideas

A few of the ladies on my gift list will be getting these items for Christmas. I love that they are quick and easy to make up and you can be really creative with the packaging.

Here are the links if you want to make some for your family and friends.

Lotion Bars
Sugar Scrub Cubes
Lip Balm

Homemade Shower Gel
1 cup shampoo*
1/2 cup water
1 1/2 t. salt
12-15 drops essential or fragrance oil

In a bowl mix together shampoo and water, add salt and mix well. The salt helps the shampoo to gel. Add scent oil a few drops at a time. Pour into your container and enjoy.
*The recipe calls for unscented but I like to use a scented so I don't worry about adding the fragrance and it is hard to find unscented shampoo where I live.

I love making and giving home made gifts and to hear what homemade gifts your giving this year.

Sweet Treat Container

I turned this can(you can use any type of round or square container)

into this treat container

using some cotton twine and some decorative twill tape. You can use brown twine and ribbon if you prefer, but I like the look of the cotton twine so that is what I used.


Here's how I did it.
Cover your can with twine, using thin streams of hot glue to hold it in place. I only used hot glue at the beginning and end to hold my string in place because after removing the label the glue from the can held it in place but you may have to use a dap of glue once in awhile depending on your can , making sure to secure the beginning and end really well. Be careful not to  glob it down with too much glue. Pull the twine tightly, and wrap it well, and it will stay in place.
Using the glue gun, adhere twill tape or ribbon to the top and bottom rims of the can. Create your label, and mat on card stock and scrapbook paper. I have letter stencils I use but you could print it off on the computer, use vinyl lettering, foam stamps, or other method of lettering. Distress all edges, I have a distressing tool that I use then I ink around all four edges of the paper.
Punch holes in the sides of your label, and tie ribbon in a knot through the hole. Attach the label to the twine, using the small safety pins or hot glue. I used safety pins so the label could removed and the container can then be used for something else.

Now it's ready to be filled with goodies for your friends.

Christmas Crafting

I haven't been up to much as of late other than making Christmas goodies. For the last 3 years I've given  my brother's girl friend Liz a drink mix and mug for Christmas. This year I found a really cute Snowman mug

and I thought a coaster would go great with it.

Here is a better picture of the coaster.

Then I made a non-crocheted version of my snowman ornament.

I gave it to a friend who was in the hospital having surgery on her foot. I was thinking of making up a tutorial for it. I will work on it this weekend and hopefully get it posted next week.

Lotion Bars

I am giving these little lotion bars to my family and friends for Christmas this year so I thought I'd share them with you also.

1 3/4 oz shea butter
2 oz. beeswax
2 oz coconut oil
1 1/2 t essential oil
soap mold(I used an ice cube tray)


Melt shea butter and coconut oil in a double broiler. Add beeswax and melt.Stir and allow to slightly cool; add essential oil and mix thoroughly. Pour mixture into molds and allow to cool completely. Remove from mold and package as desired. Add a label and a tag and then embellish


.

Hot Cocoa Mocha Mix

Here is another great gift idea.
3 cup hot cocoa ( I used the one with mini marshmallows)
1/2 cup instant coffee
3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 cup mini marshmallows-optional

Mix hot cocoa, instant coffee and cinnamon together.

If not giving as a gift store in an airtight container and use when desired.
To give mix and marshmallows as a gift, package mix and marshmallows in a nice container or little bag

with a cute little label.

Then make a nice little decorative tag with the instructions

Add 3 tablespoons mix to 2/3 cup of boiling water

Rice Pillow Neck Warmer

 These little bags make up in less than an hour and make a great gift or a kid's craft project,uses scrap fabric and other minimal supplies. I make mine with a removable cover so I can wash it when it gets dirty.

Supplies:
1/4 yd muslin or other solid color fabric
1/4 yd printed flannel(pre-washed)
2-3 cups of long grain rice
funnel
matching thread.

Step 1: Cut 2 pieces solid color fabric 6 1/2 x 91/2

Sew pieces together, right sides facing- with 1/4-1/2 inch seam allowance. Leave an opening for turning right side out

 Using your funnel fill pillow with rice

Sew opening closed.

Step 2: Cut flannel - 1 piece-6 1/2 x 9 1/2 and 2 pieces 6 1/2 x 6

Step 3: Hem the two smaller pieces at one end.

I fold mine down 1/4inch, iron and then fold 1/4 inch again for a total of a 1/2 inch.

Step 4: Sew one of the smaller pieces to the larger piece(right sides together) with hemmed end in the middle

 

Repeat with other side.

Step 5: Turn right side out

and insert rice pillow into outer cover.

And now you have a nice gift for yourself or a loved one.

Free pattern

 With Christmas coming and everyone putting up their tree, I figured it would be a good time to post my snowman ornament.

*This pattern has not been tested. I sent it to a couple of people to test if for me but never heard back from them. Anyway if you find any mistakes please don't hesitate to let me know. And I'd love to see a picture of your finished ornament.

Snow Woman Ornament

The head and hat can be worked in sports weight yarn, using an F hook or worsted weight, using a G hook.

This pattern is worked in the round do not turn work at the end of each round

With white yarn, ch 2, 6sc in 2^nd ch from hook, sl st to form a ring.

RND 1: 2 sc in each sc around, sl st top beg sc, ch-1.(12 sc)

RND 2: (sc, 2 sc next sc) around, sl st top beg sc, ch-1.(18 sc)

RND 3-4: sc around, sl st top beg sc, ch-1.

RND 5: (2 sc next st, sc next st) around, sl st top beg sc, ch-1. (24 sc)

RND 6-7: sc around, sl st top beg sc, ch-1.

RND 8: (2 sc next st, sc next st) around, sl st top beg sc, ch-1. (32 sc)

RND 9-10: sc around, sl st top beg sc, ch-1.

RND 11: (sc dec next 2 sts, sc next 2 sc) around, sl st top beg sc, ch-1. ( 24 sc)

RND 12-13: sc around, sl st top beg sc, ch-1.

RND 14:  ( sc dec next st, sc next st) around,  sl st top beg sc, ch-1. ( 18 sts)

RND 15-16: sc around, sl st top beg sc, ch-1.

Stuff head at this point.

RND 17: (sc dec around until 3 sc remain, sl st top beg sc, fasten off. Weave closed.

Hat

Using color of your choice-ch 2.

RND 1: 6 sc in 2nd ch from hook, sl st top beg sc, ch-1( 6 sts.)

RND 2: 2 sc in each st around, sl st top beg sc, ch-1 (12 sts.)

RND 3: * Sc in next st, 2 sc in next st; repeat from *

around, sl st top beg sc, ch-1(18 sts.)

RND 4: Working in back loops only, sc in each st around.

RNDs 5-8: Sc in each st around, sl st top beg sc, ch-1.

RND 9: Working in front loops only, 2 hdc in each st

around sl st top beg sc, ch-1.(36 sts.)

RND 10: hdc in each st around, sl st top beg hdc, ch-1 . Fasten off.

Embellish hat as desired attach to head, I used hot glue.

Glue eyes (two buttons) and nose to head.

For the nose I just used a piece of felt rolled to look like a carrot or you could use an orange button. For the mouth I used black puffy paint or you could stitch a mouth using black embroidery thread. And for the scarf I glued a piece of fabric to the bottom - that was ½ wide x 8 inches long.

A Purty Girl Pattern @ 2010-Jennifer Wentland

This pattern is for personal use only and not for sale. However the ornament can be made for personal use or to sell but please give credit to me as the designer.

P.S I am also working on a tutorial for another snowman ornament that is made with a styrofoam ball.

Finished

Here is my finished apron for the Flirty Apron swap.

Isn't my model lovely? lol. My son always agrees to be my model, he doesn't mind helping his mom out. Below is a close up of the fabric. I couldn't get a good close up of the whole apron, sorry.

I hope my partner likes her apron. I still have a couple of tuck-ins to finish up then I'll be already to send it off. I really like this apron so it's going to be hard to let it go.

Thanksgiving Favorites

With Thanksgiving coming tomorrow I'm seeing lots of people posting their favorite recipe and it started me thinking , Do I really have a Thanksgiving favorite? HMM, I don't eat turkey, I prefer ham, I'm not big on pumpkin pie, in fact I really haven't eaten pie since my Grandpa passed away last year. He was the baker in our family and his cherry pie was the best. I guess I'm just not ready to tackle eating pie yet. Anyway as I was saying about Thanksgiving favroites. I keep asking myself what they are, the stuffing my family makes comes from a box, yes I know they are missing out on the good stuff by using the boxed mix.  But still not my favorite. My husband loves my pumpkin roll and I'm ok with it but is it really my favorite? Nah not really.
My 18 year old son makes Bubble Pizza every year and we like it well enough but still not my fave.

What I kept asking myself is your Thanksgiving favorite? Well the only thing I could think of was Grandma's Potato Salad.

This is my Grandma, she is 83 years old and everyday I spend with her I count as a blessing.
She makes the best potato salad and no gathering is complete without it. Thanksgiving is not Thanksgiving without Grandma's potato salad. Grandma has no recipe for it. She just puts a little of this and a bit of that and it tastes great every time. If only I could cook half as good as Grandma.I've made her potato salad and mine comes close but still doesn't taste near as good as Grandma's. She has been making her special potato salad for longer then I've been alive so she's had lots of time to perfect it.
What makes Grandmas Potato Salad so good is all the time and love she puts into it.

Note: I will try to get Grandma to set down and write up her recipe so I can share it on Thanksgiving.

Pretty Snowman

Here is an ornament I made for my swap partner in the Flirty Apron swap. We have to add some tuck ins to send with our apron and the word I chose was snow.Below is the list of tuck ins my partner will be getting

S-snowman ornament
N-note cards ( I will decorate them myself)
O-oatmeal lace cookie recipe
W- washcloth (crocheted by me)

as soon as I have them all done I will post them.

I am working on the pattern for the snowman ornament. I have made several of these over years and everyone loves them. Last year my son gave them to his teachers and they were thrilled to receive them.You can see them in this post. I do hope my partner likes it.

My appoliges and some swaps.

I've been a tad bit boring lately I know and I even tried giving up my blog. I was trying to do other forms of art but that isn't really working out for me so I've gone back to what works best and that seems to be sewing and crochet which I'll show you later. I decided to try and blog again and hopefully be a better blogger. but I'm not making any promises.

I joined a few Christmas swaps. One is the Flirty Apron Swap. We have to make a Christmas apron for our partner. the apron must have at least one snow flake. My partner said she like snowmen and gingerbread men but when I saw this fabric(raided from a friends stash)

I knew this is what I wanted to make her apron with. I hope she likes it. I am making a cut full size apron using a free pattern I found on the Sew 4 Home website. It is a vintage style apron and a first for me. I really don't like to use patterns when I sew but when I saw that one I fell in love with it. I plan to make myself one after I finish with my partners. We have to include tuck in the spell out a word. I've choosen the word snow and will be working on my tuck in as soon as the apron is finished.

The next swap I joined was Aunt Pitty Pat's Crumb Catcher swap. We have to make a mug rug for our partner. I'm still working on my idea for that. I had started one but it didn't turn out so well so I'm back to square one. I do have new the fabric picked out for it just need to figure out what I'm gonna do with it.

Cupcake Provocateur Giveaway

Head over to the Flirty Apron swap blog and checkout the Cupcake Provocateur Giveaway. Part of the giveaway is open to non-swapper you can enter to win a $25 Gift Certificate to put towards anything on the Cupcake Provocateur site! So what are you waiting for head over there for your chance to win

Giving Up

I will be giving up blogging. I just don't seem to be very good at it and haven't had much time to keep up this blog in the last few months. Because of not keeping it up I've lost most of my followers anyway. If you're still reading I have to say good bye it was fun while it lasted and I met some very nice people and I wish you all well.

Hugs to you all.

Being happy

Today while driving home from work I was a sign that said choose each day to be happy. It really made me do some thinking. I have had some pretty rotten things happen to me in my life but yet I didn't let them get me down. Why? Because as the sign said I chose to be happy and ya know it made all the bad situations seem less terrible. Sure they were things I didn't want to deal with but I chose not to let them rule me and I can honestly look back and say I am Happy with the way I handled things.

So today and everyday I choose to be happy and my heart feels light. How you choose to live your life makes a world of difference.If you choose to be negative about everything then those around you will most likely pick up on the bad vibes and treat you accordingly but if you choose each day to be happy, everyone around you can't help but feel happy too.

So as the sign said Choose each day to be happy and live life to the fullest!

Life Lessons

I am thankful to have You, my friends. All who comment on and read this blog. I thank you! I have told Mr W. so many times what a warm and loving community of folks blog land is. That is completely true. I however do need to try to comment back as much as I possibly can. and if I miss you it is not intentional! Life comes at me some days.
As it has in the last few weeks. I haven't said much about what has happened with my family lately but I feel I need to get it off my chest. My husband lost his job on July 14th. After nine years of hard work, long hours and busting his butt and being stressed to the point of being constantly grouchy to please these people he was let go for a very stupid reason. Each year the week of July fourth his former employer would shut down for a week and most of the employees got the whole week off which was not always the case with my husband, sometimes he had to work to fix mistakes and screw ups the bosses made.
Well this year they shut down and for once gave Mr W. the week off also. So we headed to Kentucky for four days of camping (which we really enjoyed). We left on Saturday and returned on Tuesday but supposedly while we were gone they say that they called him to tell him he had to work the following Thursday and Friday. We have caller id and cell phones which show no record of any phone calls from them.
So when he returned to work the following Monday he was let go because he missed two days of work and did not call off.
Let me ask you how can a company fire someone when they did not even know they were supposed to work? Then they tell him they might be able to get him his job back. Might? They were in the wrong but yet it's his fault and they MIGHT be able to give him his job back but they had to talk to corporate office . Ha what a laugh- I told him after all the time he's put in there that this was there way of showing their appreciation , he was not going to wait around for them to decide that they might let him come back. So the very next day he went job hunting and found another job that is less stressful but also less pay. He was there about a week and then his former employer calls to say that they have decided at this time they can not let him return to work but maybe in the future they may reconsider. Mr W. said it felt good to be able to tell them that he already had a job. He said they sounded surprised when he told them, guess they expected him to sit around waiting on their call.

As I said though this job is less pay but I am thankful that his did manage another job so quick however now we have to cut back on our expenses which we have been working on so far and I do have to say it does feel as a little freeing.I know that we might find times when we may be a little low on cash but I feel we will make it through this and learn to be more self sufficient.

If there is one thing we are learning from this situation it is we can get buy with less and still be just as happy.

Birdiville Boutique

Hopefully the birth of a new business venture.
My husband and I have decided to try selling bird related items.My husband has a passion for the birds and our yard is full of many, many birdhouses all created by him along with a few feeders so we are making birdhouses, bird feeders, wire birds nest jewelry and many other bird related items. Our hope is to sell these items at our local farmers market if our schedule ever works out.

Here are just a few pictures of what we have made. There are many more in the works. No two items are exactly alike.


I have more I need to take pictures of and then I will show you the rest of what we have come up with.
Right now we are having fun coming up with new birdhouses and feeders. I just hope the fun doesn't wear out. The question however is will others like them enough to buy them?