Christmas Part Two

She absolutely LOVES this dog.
I think she thinks it's real, she was giving out treats to Jet and brought one over
to this guy and put it in his mouth. Seriously, too stickin' adorable!

Christmas Part One

This is from Christmas Eve, Santa was VERY good to Lola!

You can't see in this picture, but presents continued to the left, and behind where I was standing taking the picture too. And to think that Santa agreed to take it easy.

 

Phew, all these gifts are exhausting!
Time for a rest with Daddy.

Christmas Part Two tomorrow.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year!

Wishing you all a safe and happy New Year.
I wish for each of you that the year to come is filled with peace, love,
kindness, smiles, creativity, health, and laughter.

As a side note, I have not neglected posting about our amazing Christmas Day, I have been quite busy this past week, and promise to post about our Christmas and all the incredibly amazing and thoughtful gifts Lola received this coming week.

Then, hopefully the following week, I will finally get to post her Birthday Party which was back in October. I have a bunch of fantastic tutorials, recipes, and party ideas for you.

Santa's Workshop

 Jeff was so excited to have his first late Christmas Eve night toy assembling project.

 Uncle Jim was a big help!

 Uncle Beezer, not so much.

The guys got it done in plenty of time, and it looks fantastic!
She is going to be so surprised!

See the finished project here.

Pine Cone Elf

 

I was so excited when I came across these sweet little pine cone elves from this shop.
The seller sells them in sets of three, but  is unfortunately (for us)
on vacation from her shop at the moment.

While I absolutely support buying from crafters and their shops, and encourage you
to do the same... They look simple enough to make yourself (since she is away), and could
be a fantastic follow up (or alternative) to the elf craft in this post from the other day.

Kiddos will have so much fun gathering all the pine cones!!

Which is ALWAYS a fun outdoor activity!

Oh my gosh, how many different ways could we use these little guys??
Ornaments (which is how she suggests)
Attach to gifts as fun little adornments
Wine glass identifiers
In a Christmas village as an alternative to traditional snowmen
Presents for children's friends, or teacher
Attach to a Christmas card as a thoughtful personal touch
Place markers at the Christmas dinner table
Kids can attach them to string, and have a pine cone elf marionette show

I could go on all day!


All the images in this post are from the original shop.

Wrapping It Up

I love making gift wrap fun and beautiful, and love it even more  when
I am able to re-purpose materials that would otherwise be waste. 

Above is a grouping of Chirstmas gifts that Lola will find under the tree on the 25th.

She  loves the snowmen decorations, dolls, and ornaments so much that I had wrap some of her gifts in the form of a snowman reusing birthday paper inside out, felt from her Halloween costume, and craft paper left over from her birthday projects that I will finally get around to posting her birthday after the holidays.

I can't wait to see her adorable little face on Christmas morning!



Below are several wrapping ideas from around the web to inspire you this gift giving season.

A tutorial on how to make this bow can be found here.
I love that this is done with newspaper, but the possibilities are endless with mixing and matching colorful papers.

I love the simplicity of this wrapping.
It's basic, yet thoughtful with a personalized note printed on the re-purposed bag.

This is among my favorites this year.
I don't know a child, or adult that wouldn't be overcome with joy when they were given this sweet little reindeer filled with cookies or presents. You can find the tutorial here.

This is a fantastic project that even very little ones can help you with by allowing them to hole punch paper (bonus motor skill activity) either before or after you cut out the silhouette.
This template can be found here, but you could get creative and design you own.

This is such a simple, yet elegant wrapping.
What I love most is that when all the gifts have been unwrapped, the photograph remains
as a keepsake from a favorite photographer.

I love when gift tags are functional and fun.
This elf craft tutorial is one that can be easily done by children to attach to gifts.
OR you could assign a color to each child and attach elves to gifts from Santa to avoid any suspicion due to recognizable handwriting.
This could also be a tradition, of Santa sending an ornament via a gift tag for each child to add to the tree next year.

This look and many others can be achieved with these peel offs.


Keep in mind that most of these examples can be recreated by re-purposing 
materials that you already have saving you a little cash, and minding your carbon footprint. 

Outside the Gift Box

 To give a gift is truly one of life's greatest pleasures; my beautiful sister Katie's
wedding shower was the perfect opportunity to make her feel special by "thinking
outside of the gift box" with well designed gift wrap. I believe that when you put
as much thought into the presentation of your gift as you do to what goes inside
it becomes a visual gift as well. For Katie's gifts I wrapped the boxes in coordinating
paper, stacked them, secured them with a dab of hot glue, and adorned them with
beautiful ribbons and high quality dried flowers to resemble wedding cakes.

When wrapping gifts, waste is always concern,  I selected only beautiful
high quality supplies that could re-purposed as potpourri by simply adding a favorite
scent, as a memento of this special occasion.

To create the custom monogrammed gift tags, I simply punched a hole above

the monogram on coasters that I found at my local craft store, threaded ribbon though,
and attached them to the gifts with a glue gun. I left enough ribbon so that the tags
could be re-purposed as personalized first Christmas ornaments as a married couple.