A Homemade Christmas

Christmas has come and gone, quite successfully. This year has been a year of trying to reduce and to hand make as many gifts as we can. It all started way back in November, which is the key in being able to have a homemade holiday. Pinterest became my best friend as I scoured for ideas and it gave me a great place to save all of my favorite ideas for when I was ready to try them. I have a habit of holding on to anything that may serve some useful purpose which in this instance helped me out tremendously. I was able to 'shop' in my stash and spend very little at actual stores.

Now that Christmas is over and I don't have to worry about ruining any surprises I am able to share with you the things that I made. I took my Pinterest inspirations and made them into my own based on the supplies I had available. These crafts would make perfect gift for anytime of year especially birthdays.

This is the inspiration for my Christmas Animal in Tin. I took the idea and made it my own opting to make a bear instead, along with a Christmas themed tin. These tins were recycled from a tea set my husband received as a gift from a vendor at his work.

Homemade soap was one of the most fun crafts of the season. My girl and I cheated and used a melt and pour kit purchased at a craft store since we have never made soap before. We left out the harsh smelling fragrance oils that came with the kit and used 4 drops of lavender essential oil and 3 drops of lemon essential oil for each bar. The bars were finished off with a home printed label.

I crocheted wash cloths to go with the soap gift and while I did not use a pattern what I did is very smiler to this. It was a quick project and I think it is something that would be suitable to help a beginner crocheter to gain a sense of accomplishment. A nice a small project.

Peppermint Scrub was added to the crochet wash cloth and soap. It was a fun and simple recipe.

My inspiration for a felt tic tac toe game. The pink was not really going to suit the little boy who was getting this gift and I opted for a button closure on the back. Again I really tried to make it my own. I cut felt for the lines and then paint x's and o's on to squares of felt. I am hoping that this will be something that the little boy could use on his train commute to school each day.

 

 These were the gifts that we gave the kids teachers. Cute little sleighs made out of candy, topped with a bow and accompanied by a card decorated by the kids. My eight year old tried her hand at the glue gun for the first time while Little Guy was more that happy to let me glue while waiting to see if there would be any candy left for him to eat.

The neighbors always get cookies from us. We love baking and we each have our own favorite type of cookies so we make a lot of them. Giving them away keeps us from eating them all while sharing in the  season with those in our community. Here are our favorite recipes:
Chocolate Chip
Peanut Butter
Snickerdoodle
Sugar

There were several other crafts I made that I did not take a photo of once I was finished but I will share the link because they were really cute projects for babies.  I made both the fabric ball and the tag blanket from this website.

All of our gifts were very well received and we had a great time as a family making the preparations for the holiday. We spent the time together and thanks to careful planning and thinking ahead were able to get in done without rushing to the last minute. I hope you find some of these gifts ideas fun and give them a try. Happy crafting!