Gifts Galore

My gift-making is almost complete- hurray! The crafts below are much simpler than the body scrub and felted soap mentioned in my previous post. These are quick and inexpensive projects that make great gifts. I love when the finished product looks like it required more money and labor than it actually did. Forgive the picture quality- taken from my phone.

{Framed Cards}

This only required a couple quotable cards, simple inexpensive frames and for the mattes, I used my leftover card stock. Voila!

{Glass Magnets}

These magnets can be made as goofy or sophisticated as desired. For some of the magnets, I even used some of the card stock I had with a pretty stamp design. You can also use any design on paper but magazines work the best, I think. I actually printed a bunch of images from my computer but when it came time to glue them down, the ink smeared so much that I had to scrap them. Lesson learned! Elmer's glue is used on the front and back of the image to adhere it to the glass gem. After it dries, the magnet backing can be glued on using a strong craft glue (like "Goop"). I used little cardboard boxes from the craft store that were just the right size for these tiny gems.

(Now, I have to start a list of who receives what for each holiday- duplicates would be embarrassing!)

-K

New Endeavors

My head is overflowing with creativity lately! I decided to start this blog as a way to organize my thoughts as well as share with others the outcomes of my creative madness. The holiday season is only adding to this rampage, since I'm not only making individual items, but sometimes seven and eight of each! And, I must say, I'm enjoying every minute of it. For once, gift-giving doesn't feel like a chore!

The fruits of my labor:

{A sugar body scrub}

My good friend Jess turned me on to this recipe.

(from Mark Montano's Big Ass Book of Crafts)

I made them in lemon green tea & orange cranberry pomegranate, which was my own concoction. The aroma is to die for! Mark suggests including a pretty spoon or scooper for each scrub but I'm giving loofahs (cheaper and easier to find).

ps- most everything is recycled, from the mason jars to the ribbon!

{Felted Soap}

I've seen these before but it seems like the felted soaps are becoming quite popular lately. Turns out, they're not very difficult to make so I thought I'd try my hand at them. My only complaint- somewhat labor intensive for my scrawny arms. With a few breaks in between, it really wasn't too bad though. At first, I used Olay bar soap which was rectangular in shape with rounded edges and slightly concave underneath. The odd curvature of this soap made it difficult to felt evenly. Then I tried Pear's bar soap which is for the most part completely oval, and it was so much easier (and it's only $.99!). I loved this craft but I will be in search of better deals on wool, possibly online.

Now, I'm working on some magnet gems with an antique flare. Stay tuned for pictures!

-K