Handmade for the Holidays

Hi!  I have something a little different to share with you today.  Every year, my daughters participate in our family's Thanksgiving Day ornament swap.  My girls create their handmade ornaments, wrap them, and join in the Sneaky Santa game played to receive new ornaments.  My Mom and her sisters still get together for Thanksgiving, so it's a pretty big crowd and the game is always a lot of fun.  Most players bring purchased ornaments, so the handmade ones are quite unique and always a crowd favorite.  

DD1 loves to embroider and wanted to use embroidery on her ornaments.  She was trying to think of a way to frame her pieces, when she received inspiration from a beautiful handmade ornament I received from a dear blogging friend, Heather.  She loved the idea of using the canning rings as a frame and quickly set to work creating her rustic Christmas ornaments.

DD1's ornaments

Heather's ornament

DD2 enjoys making things out of paper and found materials, so she created three tag style ornaments using wood tags as her base and applying pretty Christmas papers.  She really liked the poinsettia I made for my scrapbook page and wanted to make her own to go on the tag. 

DD2's ornaments

I think all of these ornaments are absolutely beautiful! Now I just need to convince my DDs to make a few extra ornaments to add to their mother's tree!

Thanks so much for visiting and I hope these talented people inspired you to make some lovely decorations for your own tree, or maybe even to give as gifts!  Have a wonderful week, and for those who celebrate Advent with me, Happy First Week!

Scrapbooking with some Christmas Cocoa

I am still on that mission to finish up my pack of Christmas Cocoa pattern paper!  Today's project used up two larger pieces of paper and some smaller pieces as well.  I'm also happy that I have another Christmas scrapbook page ready for a photo!

The poinsettia was made using both pattern paper and cardstock.  I punched lots of petals with the poinsettia punch, inked the edges to give the flower a little depth and then began gluing all of the pieces together.  The silk leaves were in my 'bits and pieces' basket just waiting for the perfect use.  I also managed to use a wooden Christmas tag that I bought a few years ago, and the strip of sparkly, red glitter is some new ribbon that I bought at Big Lots (yes...I know I didn't really need to add to my ribbon stash, but this was oh so pretty and it worked so well on this page!).  

Now the only things left from this pack is a full sheet of the red and white that you see at the top of the scrapbook page, and three smaller pieces.  This just might happen!!

On a side note, I am enjoying (?) an extended Thanksgiving break due to my DH having shoulder surgery on Tuesday.  I have the rest of the week off and while I am spending some time playing nursemaid, I am enjoying the extra time to start decorating for Christmas and winter.  I might even make some cookies for my patient if he manages to behave himself!

Thanks so much for stopping by and have a wonderful day!