handmade gifting: family fun activity binder

For my SIL, Danielle, I had a hard time deciding what to make for her.  Jeremy thought of a binder where we put activities and money and supplies to do fun things throughout the year. Since she is a single working mom of 2, she doesn't have oodles of time to prep fun things, so here is what I came up with! I started with the biggest binder I could get and dividers for each month.

Then I printed out these cute calendar pages from Hello, Cuteness! and looked up fun "holidays" to fill them in with.  So here is a sampling of the things in the binder.  There was a  crown craft for epiphany, a few dollars for balloons to send off on Balloon Ascension Day, a microwave peanut brittle recipe for Peanut Brittle Day, some giant bubble wrap to pop on Bubble Wrap Appreciation Day, A wax paper/crayon shaving craft for early February Valentine's decorating,

A couple different pancake recipes for pancake day, Math games for World Math Day, bracelet making supplies for Middle Name Pride Day so that each could make a bracelet with their middle names (Which works out great since all three of them go by their middle names), some gold chocolate coins for hiding around on St. Patrick's Day, 

Supplies for an Easter bunny craft, a haiku for National Haiku Poetry Day, a Yoda craft for May the 4th, a dvd with a few different renditions of the chicken dance for National Chicken Dance Day, some money for buying zucchini seeds to plant, 

Doughnut recipe, family size tea bags for Iced Tea day, money for planting pumpkins in preparation for carving in October, money for ice cream, 

Friendship bracelet supplies for Friendship Day, a reminder for Sneak Some Zucchini onto your Neighbor's Porch Night (I put the money for planting zucchini early enough that she should have plenty for this..), kid friendly recipe for Kids Take Over the Kitchen Day, a short story for Roald Dahl Day, and each of them got a card and a mini gift for their birthdays,  

Money for chocolate cupcake baking, origami instructions and paper for Origami Day, a cookie recipe  to try out for National Cookie Day, instructions for origami ninja stars for International Ninja Day, money for a chocolate bar to use for Chocolate Covered Anything Day, and some Christmas themed puzzles. 

So I packed a LOT in there (I had to tie a ribbon around it to get it closed) and hopefully it will be a whole year of fun for them!  I'm thinking this would be a fun thing to give as a family gift or for a kid, too.

handmade gifting: fire starters and firewood sling

For my brother the outdoorsman and for Jeremy I made some of these skull fire starters.  I'd seen a few different variations around the internet (These from ThisHumbleHome made with cotton rounds, and a few options here and here) and decided to go with flammable material in wax since it would travel easily to Ohio.  I used a little silicon-skull-ice cube tray-mold-THING that I got from the Dollar Tree around Halloween. I poured in a bit of melted wax (leftover candles) first so the face would look nice and then I shoved as much mossy stuff in as possible and put some more wax on top. I plan to try drier lint next, but I think this maybe looked nicer for a gift.

Chris also got a firewood sling for carrying firewood to his campsite.  I got the inspiration from here where they re-purposed a canvas tote bag. It is shown folded in half, but it opens up and lays flat so that you can load up wood of all lengths and then just pick it all up by the handles. This was made with a piece of canvas drop cloth, some pleather for the handles and then I used a freezer paper stencil and acrylic paint to make the picture on the side. I'm hoping to make one of these for Jeremy as well!

handmade gifting: pocket watch photo album

Grampa has a collection of pocket watches going back generations, so when I saw this pocket watch photo album idea from The Mother Huddle, I thought it would be perfect! I found a pocket watch shell on Ebay and put grandkid pictures in. 

I used some no sew Heat n Bond to attach the photos to a strip of fabric. I also added a little felt circle and heart at the bottom to help it look a bit more "finished" and a tab at the end to help lift the photos out. 

It was a fun little project and I'm happy with how it turned out! 

handmade gifting: laptop sleeve

I needed some sort of gift that would be sufficiently nerdy for my gamer brother. I had mom measure his laptop while he wasn't looking and made him a laptop sleeve.  It's another one of those things that would be easier if you could try it out along the way, so hopefully his laptop actually fits in it.  My first thought was to do an Atari logo on the front, since he plays lots of video games on his computer, but then I thought the commodore 64 logo would be perfect since we spent tons of time playing video games on the computer when we were little.

handmade gifting: jedi cloak/cape

A hooded cape was requested for one of my Star Wars obsessed nephews. It's sort of a cloak/cape combo, and I just had to make it up as I went.  Sam gets frustrated when velcro capes get pulled off, so I did an elestic/velcro combo to help it stay on better. It was rather hard to get a picture of without a model....

So I stole another picture from here on Robyn's blog.  

handmade gifting: eReader covers

For my BIL and SIL I made covers for his tablet (Ohio State colors for him) and her iPad mini (pretty pattern for her). I used this pattern from the pinkpoodlebows shop on etsy.

The pattern was very detailed and came with different measurements for different eReaders. It is something that would be easier to work on if you have the eReader with you so that you can check to make sure it is fitting into what you're sewing.

But hopefully they work!

handmade gifting: clean-up apron

For Robyn I made a "clean-up" apron. She was in need of a small apron that would work for carrying  small objects (LEGOS) back to their home while she was cleaning in a different part of the house.  I love picking out fabric for Robyn because usually I can just choose something I would like!

handmade gifting: princess leia hat

After making Alice's Halloween costume, a princess Leia hat was requested for Niece #2 for Christmas. I traced the outline of a hat that was about her size and crocheted away.

And a side view.. 

And the BEST view - on little Princess Lucia. Her cuteness is overwhelming - you can find more of it here!

Side note: ever since Halloween Alice thinks ALL princesses are Princess Leia.  She has a couple Disney princess PJs and she always calls them Princess Leia. 

handmade gifting: super hero

Niece #1 has been into super hero dress up lately, so I made her a Super Abby costume for Christmas (yes, I realize Christmas was nearly 2 months ago...) .

I made a cape, mask and some shiny finger-less gloves out of some fancy fabrics that I would have loved as a kid. Not fun fabrics to work with, but I think she liked the end product!

Super Abby in action - though I'm not sure who the sidekick is.

making christmas - harry potter wands

when i was re-doing the master wish list, lane saw on the old list that he had wanted a harry potter wand and he said he still wanted one. so i was looking online to see about buying one when i stumbled on some tutorials.

since we thought gavin might like one as well, we worked on his first so we could ship it off. we used this tutorial for a light-up harry potter wand. it worked out great, and seemed to be a huge hit. but when we got around to making one for lane and oscar, we ran into problems with light bulbs not working right. finally lane just ended up with a wand from this tutorial. since he hadn't known about the light up wands he was just as happy with the regular one, but we were quite bummed.

i'm thinking about trying to make him one that looks like the elder wand for his birthday, but with so many baby things on my brain i'm not sure if i'll get to it or not!

making christmas - bible tote bag

when i told danielle that i was making things for people for christmas, she requested a small bag that would be big enough to fit a composition notebook and her bible for taking to church with her.

so that's what she got! i even added pockets and slots for pens or pencils. i bought a few fat quarters for the project, but had so much leftover fabric that i use it for nana's rice bags as well.

making christmas - crocheted scarf

after doing so much sewing, it was really really nice to take a break and crochet this scarf for aunt janie. i was a bit sad when it was finished because it was such a nice change of pace! i used the same pattern that i'm doing for the baby's sweater - i figured if i did that, i'd be able to remember pattern when i picked it up again after the new year!

making christmas - wool dryer balls

for mom i made some wool dryer balls. these are another fun little project, and we've been using some for a few months now. you really just get 100% wool yarn and make balls and let them get all felty by running them through the washer and dryer. i was so happy to find that scrap of fabric and that one piece of brown cardstock to package them up with. i also felted the cord for the bag!

making christmas - car playmats

so these were a really fun project to work on.. i made car playmats for sammy, aaron, and oscar.

sammy's was finished first (since it needed to be shipped to ohio) and i used ribbon ties on his. he also got a park with a lake that he could drive to and a store.

after making his and having a couple weeks of other projects in between, i decided to use something different to fasten the folded mat together:

aaron and oscar got tabs on theirs with velcro. i liked this solution a lot more, and wish i had thought of it the first time around.

instead of a park, they both got a used car lot. aaron loves to line up all this cars in a row, so he needed some extra parking lots. i was working on oscar's at the same time, so i made it the same as aaron's in hopes that he wouldnt figure out it was his.

he did notice there were two different ones, but figured that one of them was for sammy.

making christmas - pj pants

and for dad and the brothers, some soft flannel pajama pants. it is so hard to come up with ideas of things to make for men!

making christmas - brother-in-law magnets

for the brothers-in-law, i made some magnets with images from their favorite football teams.


ohio state for mike (of course)

these were a really fun little project, and i ended up making a bunch with the international breastfeeding symbol for the ladies at work.

and auburn for vic.

the glue we had was quite fume-y, so jeremy ended up finishing the auburn ones for me. here is the tutorial for those.

making christmas - sister aprons

for robyn and angie, i whipped up some aprons. i'm really super excited about these aprons and hope to make one for myself.

instead of a loop or tie that goes around the neck, these have two long straps that are connected at the top which go over the shoulders, cross in back, slide thru loops at the waist, and then tie in back. a bit hard to explain (i included a drawing of what it should look like in the back when i wrapped them up).

this was my own invention, so hopefully they will get used and then robyn and angie can tell me if the design needs tweaking before i make one for myself. (dont worry, i did iron these a bit before wrapping them!)

making christmas - rice heat therapy bags

next up i made some rice heat therapy bags for auntie margy and nana.


i was hoping to use purple fabrics for auntie, but dont have much purple in my stash. i actually bought some purple fabric and then returned it because it was just too ugly (i also did this with some cars fabric). i used this tutorial and it was a pretty quick project. there is also a link to printable tags for your bags.

my neck and shoulder have been so sore lately, i'm hoping i get a chance to make some of these for myself! the small bag is filled with flax seeds and fits neatly in a quart size freezer bag for storage in the freezer. i didnt put them in the freezer to test them out, but since i filled them up with flax seeds that i store in the freezer, i know they get nice and chilly!

making christmas - abby's baby carrier

so one of the things i made for christmas was a baby carrier for my niece, abby.

i used hobo mama's tutorial and leftover fleece from an orange carrier i made for myself.

i included some directions on how to use the carrier

and abby used it to carry around her turtle baby on christmas! (picture stolen from robyn)