Tuesday, December 7, 2010

A few little projects...

Happy Tuesday!!  This time of year has me feeling crafty and somewhat cheesy. Here are a few little things I have been working on:

1.  family garland:  I wanted to start adding something personal and handmade to our tree every year.  This year, I busted out my cookie cutters, glitter card stock, and pencil and started tracing:


I liked the trees, but decided to go with a gingerbread family:





2.  gift tags:   Last week I saw on How About Orange that West Elm was offering free printables on their site for cards, tags, menus, etc..  Since I adore wrapping gifts, I thought these would be the perfect tags.  I was a little disappointed when I printed them on regular paper, so I thought they needed glitter.  :)  I haven't glued them on yet, but I like how they look so far.  You will also see how I plan to wrap gifts this year....just plain white paper with the sequin garland.  While I love the look of some of the really beautiful, earthy wrapping designs I saw linked from this post, I wanted something that represented us.  ...so bright and crazy and cheery it is!  :)




3.  advent calendar:  This is more of a confession than anything.  Remember when I said I wanted to do an advent calendar?  I am still working on that project.  I ended up going in a different direction from what I posted originally and it is taking forever and is stressful!  I do know how ridiculous that sounds, but it has been the most time-consuming thing ever and if I am lucky, it will be done in time for next December.  Did I mention it is the tackiest thing ever?  I am clearly obsessed with that sequin garland and was kind of going with that theme for the calendar. Each day would add another piece  to the garland and the last day would be a Santa...maybe...honestly, I haven't gotten that far yet.  Here is some of what has been going on with this project:





4.  recipe for Christmas:  This is the cheesy part I mentioned.  :)  Using parts from some of the West Elm gift tags, I put together a "recipe for Christmas" to help me calm down when I get crazy thinking about gifts and traveling and baking and random projects like the ones above.  I have this on the island in our kitchen:

Mix peace with joy with love.  :)

7 comments:

Jennifer D. said...

You are so cute! I love all of your projects! And I do not think your calendar is tacky at all. I think it is very mod and I love it. Most of the ones I have seen are very traditional looking and that is not my style at all. Yours looks great. I hear you on things being time-consuming. Having a child just makes things take longer because you never really have a good solid block of time to work on things. :o)

That family garland is too cute!! Jen

torrie said...

I love the gingerbread garland! I like to stick to the bright, traditional colors of Christmas when it comes to wrapping/ribbon... well, for that matter- our tree, and everything else! The kids like it, and it just makes it more cheery.

I love your advent calendar- totally NOT tacky!! I've been there many times before... started a project that took way longer than I expected.

And I must say- a perfect Christmas recipe:).

Danielle (elleinadspir) said...

Great tip on the gift teags. I'm going to go print some now. And I love the Christmas recipe. I might need to steal that idea and make one!!! Just add "bubble tea" and we will be set right? :)

the southern hostess said...

You've been busy! Everything is so cute!

Sarah@Designmarc said...

Everything is adorable, Suzie! I love the calendar! I contemplated making one of my girls, but decided not to because it seemed too hard! LOL I bought one instead.

I love your gift wrap idea!

S

Michelle said...

Oh how fun! Crafts are such a fun part of Christmas!!!

Cassie {Hi Sugarplum} said...

LOVE the family garland...so fun and funny! Thanks for stopping by my blog...I'm thrilled to have found yours now too!