Holiday Crafts Archives | Page 6 of 8 |

Seriously Creative Egg Decorating | Easter Photo Series

April 6, 2010 By Laura 5 Comments

You know people are serious about creative egg decorating, when they break out the airbrush and air compressor!
The kids got creative in their own way! Check out the results in this Easter Photo Series.

It is our hope that all of the beautiful colors, creativity, and spirit of Easter in this post, brought you all of the joy that it brought us!
We are so glad you dropped by to check out our fun.

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Palm Cross

March 20, 2010 By Laura Leave a Comment

With Palm Sunday almost upon us once again, we thought we would re-post this tutorial which we had in the Big Picture section last year, on how to make a nice cross for your home, with the blessed palms you bring home from mass on Palm Sunday. We hope you find the instructions and photos helpful, and the craft enjoyable, in making a beautiful palm cross for the walls of your home.

First, take 3 sets of 2 palms each, and at least one good palm wisp.

In the area the intersection of the cross is, put the ends of one set of palms alternately layered in between 2 of the others, going in the opposite direction of course.

Then takes the last set, and layers those for the other side.

Pinching it all together at the intersection, take one side of the palms and makes a loop with them to the back of your cross.

Securing that with your fingers to the middle as well, and then do the same with the other side.

With the formed cross in hand, take the wisp of palm you had set aside, and start wrapping the intersection of the crossed pieces, to secure them tightly.

The below collage, to be viewed left to right in rows top to bottom, is not every single move. It just gives you a general idea of how it is wrapped around, crisscrossing, and going up and down as well.

When you only have about 2 inches left, turn the cross over, place it on the table, and holding the wrap tightly, take the remaining end and feed it under the wrap a couple of times, and then just pull it tightly. The front of the middle of the cross then looks like the last square in the above collage.That’s it!

We hope you have a happy and peace filled Palm Sunday !

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Fan Pulls: for Winter and February

January 29, 2010 By Laura 9 Comments

I have found I enjoy making fan pulls for our home decor, to go with various seasons or holidays. But it was almost the end of January, when I put up our winter-themed fan pull. Reasons being, I had to make it first! Next year, they will all be up right on time, because they’ll all already be made. But for this little craft-session, I also made February’s. A LOVE theme of course.

We’ll look at the winter one first. This one we’ll probably use maybe in late November, if it has snowed, and maybe the first week or so of December. But then we’ll be having our Christmas fan pull up for the rest of December. The winter one here will go back up for the month of January, and maybe early March until it feels like spring. Unless of course I make a St.Patrick’s Day one, although we’re not Irish. But I suppose that’s not St. Patrick’s fault. lol

I’d like to take this opportunity to say . . . fan pulls are very hard to photograph! Maybe I’m not using the right lens, that I don’t have. : ) But I just can’t seem to capture beauty of the fan pulls, in relation to the room, if that makes any sense. So…I do the best I can for you. They are also difficult to crop, being a very thin piece straight down so – forgive me for some of the tall vertical photos that require extra-scrolling. I did get into the photo taking because, they have beautiful detail. So the extra photos are just some art-fun I was having, that I hope you’ll appreciate.

The winter fan pull was easy to make, because I found little snowflakes, already on a chain! So I bought 2 of them, and just connected them. I used 26 gauge wire at the very top and like last time, just sort of balled it, to slip into the catch from the actual fan chain higher up.

You will find I am showing lots of seemingly similar photos in this post, because I want to show you the various displays of color that these throw when the light hits them. BEAUTIFUL hanging there on a sunny day.

See here….blues, purples….
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… and here….oranges and pinks!
So as it spins or swings some, it’s just lovely with the colors changing rapidly.
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Here is a closer up of the snowflakes on the chain.

Yesterday when I was making them, it was snowing out!

But it’s gone today. It’ll snow again though.

The gorgeous big snowflake on the bottom, I found separately at the craft store, and added to the snowflake chains.
Love the colors in this one above.

Now look at this! Same big snowflake from a different angle. See?
It’s glass or crystal I think. I’m not sure.
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Here is the snow flake chain laying on the table.
It is SO much easier for me to photograph them this way, than them hanging in the middle of the room.
Pretty though, huh?

So these are more what they look like hanging up. It’s just hard to photograph that way.

I couldn’t stop taking photos. lol

So…..that’s for winter.

For February, the month of love, here is what I did….

…which again, the photo just doesn’t do it justice. I do want to mention that this one IS threaded beads all the way. And, unlike using 26 gauge wire all the way through as I did for December’s, I found that heavy fishing line works great! I did double it for extra strength, just in case. And THEN, I used the wire to attach at the top. It’s one of those things, like with anything new, you learn a little bit every time, and do better next time. If you recall, December’s has a little swagger, from the wire through the beads. It didn’t hang straight. I SAID I liked it, and thought it gave it character. But I just didn’t want to do it over. ; ) I like the slinky flexibility of heavy fishing line, much better.

So here is a much better and closer look. Red beads in 2 different sizes, some little silver bars, and some diamond-like studded squares. I LOVE them. They did not come with the red beads….I put them all together. They were all cheap-cheap.

But the big heart at the bottom….not so much!! When I found it, it was SO PERFECT and JUST what I was looking for for the bottom of this fan pull. So I looked to see how much it was. $15.00!! It was a cubic zirconia. I almost cried. I mean….I just don’t spend money on such frivolous things. We can’t!! But I REALLY wanted it! Most all of the beads were on sale….so I was thinking, somehow, this one must be too. It was with all of the beads. So {A} brought it to the register to have them price check it. But guess what? It was really and truly $15.00.

I just stood in the aisle…frozen. I couldn’t spend that on it, and I couldn’t leave with out it. So there was nothing else to do, but just stand there. With my whole family around me, who were losing their patience.

So, Michael finally said, “Oh just get it!!. Gosh….every time I pull that fan chain, I’m going to say, “$15.00!! $15.00!!” He really would too. Trust me. Not that I would ever forget myself….but the joy of seeing the beauty of it would help me get past it, in time. But not Michael. Well, I already felt guilty enough. That little announcement would surely tarnish that ‘love’ feeling I would have had going on through-out the month of February. So….when I got to the register, I did what I would recommend YOU ALL DO, whenever you can. I begged for a coupon or a discount! I said, “Please….do you have a coupon hanging around I can use?” And she said promptly answered, “No I don’t. Sorry.” (For the record, she didn’t really sound sorry.) So I said, “But my husband said he is going to say “$15.00″ every time he pulls the fan pull chain!”. THEN she said….“Actually, I guess I do have this 40% off one item coupon in my drawer here.”

See? : ) So then I did the happy dance, let out a “YA-HOOOO!!” through out the whole store, the kids said, “MAMAAAA!“, and then I thanked her profusely, of course.

She said I was welcome, and I believed her that time.

Oohh….Be still my heart! (No pun intended. lol)

It’s a gorgeous piece, is it not?

I think the whole fan pull, is just beautiful. Classy. Gorgeous. It twinkles!

And every time Michael pulls that chain to turn the fan on and off, he can smile and say…

“40% off!”.

“40% off!”

Well Folks, that’s it for this edition of ‘Fan Pulls’!

I hope you found that my crafting, and shopping tips, inspired you!

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Christmas Gift Jars and Baked Good Ideas

January 1, 2010 By Laura 4 Comments

For those who have been visiting our blog long enough, you’d probably know that we usually get very crafty for Christmas gifts for loved ones. But unfortunately, some years we were low on both time and money, to really craft as much as we would like to for gifts. Still, we prefer to show our love to our loved ones at Christmas, with more homemade sort of gifts, if we can. So we had the idea this year of sending some Christmas gift jars and baked goods. It would be simple, inexpensive, yet appreciated we were sure. Who doesn’t love food…right?

You should know, this post is not sharing the actual recipes we used. We are just sharing with you the idea of gift jars, and some presentation ideas, as inspiration, for your own gift giving. Gift jar recipes are very easy to find though! You can just do a web search, or….check Pinterest for a wealth of jar recipe ideas! Here though, we just want to show you what we came up with.

So some jars we made up with most of the ingredients to make Oatmeal Raisin Cookies.
All they needed to add was the butter, egg and vanilla!

Most of our gift recipients got a jar just like this, with the measured dry ingredients and directions. But we knew my 2 bachelor brothers, and my Dad, were not going to be baking anything. lol. So…..we baked theirs for them, and filled up the jar with the cookies. Cookies in a jar! So there is another idea for you!

We also gave some people the dry ingredients for this Curried Lentil Soup. What a big project THIS turned out to be. Because the recipe calls for red and yellow lentils. After visiting 6 stores all over town, over the course of a week, we settled for red and green. Maybe you know better where to get them? If not, don’t toss the idea all together, if you like the idea of soups. Again, search for recipes, and you’ll find more than you can shake a . . . . . . a . . . . . . spoon at. 🙂

Initially, we could only find tan, and made some soup ourselves to test the recipe. Not being lentil experts, we thought only the color was different. But ummm….not so much. We HOPE the red & green works out alright for everyone.

We also made loaves of fresh homemade bread (not pictured) , and included those in most packages.

And homemade donuts! : D

We got calls and messages from everyone, and they all seemed to really enjoy our tasty gifts! We think they probably ‘tasted the love‘. But one did tell us the bread and donuts were kind of hardish, or heavy, when they arrived. Now….the bread crust is. You can knock on the loaf, but it’s soft on the inside. It makes excellent toast, it’s great for sandwiches, and it goes well with soup, too!

But the donuts, being fried, we really weren’t sure HOW they would fair in shipping. So I guess they arrived….a little dense. Now, we take these things very seriously. So, we asked ourselves what we may have learned from that outcome, and this is what we came up with:

Don’t share our donuts anymore!!
No, seriously, we’ll be working on our recipe, to make them a little lighter. 😀 For the rare occasion we make them again, because they aren’t the healthiest regular food to eat. But they are a real treat, and that’s in part what make the holidays so special.

Some pretty ribbon on your jars, with an attached tag that shares the recipe or directions, is a very warm and thoughtful gift, for anyone who eats!
Your tag can be hand-written as well. It actually makes it all the more handmade-appeal.

We hope these ideas make your Christmas gift-giving season fun, delicious, and budget-friendly.

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Kids’ Thankful Tree

November 30, 2009 By Laura 4 Comments

Like many of you, this past Thanksgiving, we counted our blessings.
And the kids created a little ‘Thankful Tree’.
We are blessed. So very blessed.

We don’t have a lot. Many are surprised at the things we simply do without.

Some is by choice. Much is by necessity.

But we know we are rich, by the simple things.

Because in all of the simple things….

is all of which we need to survive.

All of the things which we would hardly be able to bare to live without….

literally, or by the heart,

are the simple things, indeed.

So the simple things, are all we really need.

And it’s the simple things, that we couldn’t be more thankful for.

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“40% off!”

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