I actually got our fist batch of Christmas cards out this week. When I order cards, I just order extra, but when I make them I always make less at first. I don’t want extra hand-made Christmas cars lying around, because they have the kids pictures on them, I can’t use them for next year.
My sister had always sent out Christmas cards with a picture of her kids. For Ian’s first Christmas we decided that we would have one picture done with all three kids. That way we can send one card to all our joint family and friends. Almost every years since (except last year, because I didn’t do cards last year) we have sent out a joint card. Typically I just order them, but not this year.
This year I decided to go back to making my own cards, because I can just use my Silhouette Cameo. It will be easy peasy. Unless you are like me and decide you need to make a Christmas card with like a hundred pieces. Needless to say they took a little longer than I thought they would.
We went to a local mall where a few times a day they release bubble snow in the atrium. I took a picture of the kids in the falling snow and thought it would be a great idea to make a shaker card like a snow globe. I used this snow globe file from Bird’s Cards, which is a great resource for free card files.
Back to the pictures, I didn’t like the mall and all the strangers in my background so I went a head and used Photoshop to ‘fix’ it.
Doesn’t that snowy tree scene look so much better? (Which was a free desktop background file)
While the three older kids did a great job taking a group picture, Sid didn’t cooperate all that much. I had many wonderful pictures with the other three, but no Sid.
For the picture of the boys I used this picture in front of the silver tree they had up. There wasn’t a good picture of those two with the snow.
So, you wanna see how the card turned out?
I hope everyone has a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
p.s. family and friends, there is another batch going out, so don’t worry if you haven’t gotten yours yet.
My sister has one of those Christmas villages, with all the houses and the snow and stuff. This year my nieces wanted to make her a little village in a giant Mason Jar. Luckily my mom has hundreds of Mason Jars in various sizes. Remember how we made all those Cookie-in-a-Jar guest gifts for my cousins baby shower? Yep, she still has tons.
She took the kids to the craft store, got all the little things to go in the jars and turned the kids loose.
Ian made one for me and my mom put together a stand for it. I am pretty sure this was a gallon mayonnaise jar, it’s huge.
My mom made some cream-colored playdoh so the items would stay upright in the jar. She also bought some of that Kinetic Sand in cream.
Ian placed all the items himself. I absolutely love it.
His gift gave me an idea for a Christmas gift for Ian’s teacher. Luckily my mom had all sorts of stuff left over so Ian could make another jar.
Before we started decorating I used the hot glue gun and glued six blobs on the bottom of the jar for stability.
I tried to use the playdoh, but didn’t like how the stuff wouldn’t really stay up right, unless you used a hold bunch of playdoh. I didn’t really like how the playdoh looked from the outside.
So after he placed all the stuff in the jar, I took it all out along with the playdoh. Then I put it all back in how he had it, and with his instructions, but I used hot glue to secure his decorations.
He was sad that we didn’t have any more reindeer, but at least we had Santa.
This jar wasn’t as large so he couldn’t fill it quite so full. After all was secure I dumped in the plastic snow that mom got at the craft store.
I really wish I had sprayed the inside bottom of the jar with that window snow paint. I think it would have looked great, but I thought of it after, and I don’t have any….but you can use that idea, it’s all good.
Since this is a teacher gift and made in a Mason Jar I thought these tags would be perfect!
I designed the tag in Silhouette Studio software. For the jar I used the print ‘n cut method, and cut the lid out in two layers.
Love the tag? I know, it’s super cute. And you are in luck, cause you can download here. For free.
This PDF file is the above printable tag for Christmas.
This SVG file is for those of you who would like to use it in your cutting machine. I did have to change the font for the SVG file because it was a little too thin for cutting.
Please note this design is for PERSONAL USE only please. Please do not forward, share, sell or distribute the files for any commercial purposes or claim as your own design. Thanks a bunch!
I love hosting baby showers and birthday’s and well any party really. I don’t want to toot my own horn (OK, yes I do), but my sister and I throw some amazing parties.
One of my cousins, Bailey was expecting her first baby this month. Our other cousin Darcy wanted to throw Bailey a shower, with the help of my sister and me.
A little background information for you, I have a boat load of cousins. And it can kinda get confusing, as there are two that I am going to talk about, but they are not sisters, they are also cousins.
The three of us started brainstorming about themes, my sister and Darcy throwing down some great 80’s cartoon themes. When Darcy says ‘Oh, I know! Rainbow Brite!’
A little side note: when Bailey found out they were having a girl she said “…she will wear and use anything that she is given but if you have color choices, go easy on the pink please we like the whole rainbow” so a rainbow theme was just perfect for her. Plus there was a whole ton of Rainbow Brite playing going on whilst growing up.
So to work I went on the invitations. I had less than a week to design, cut and send them out, so I went with a simple design. We also kept the theme secret from the Mom-to-be. That was really fun. I of course use my Silhouette Cameo to make the invitations and other decorations.
I cut out different colored circles in various sizes and sewed them together. This was my first time sewing paper, and I am now hooked!
We really wanted some tissue paper pom-poms and decided to make some ourselves. We got some tissue paper packs from the dollar store, instead of separating the tissue paper by color we decided to make them rainbows too.
I think we bought two or three packs, and made about nine small ones and four large ones. More than a dozen pom-poms for $3!
They look great all clustered together.
Of course I also had to make some rosettes, my other favorite party decoration. I used plain colored card-stock and matched each of the Color Kids to the color of the rosette. On the other side of the rosette the circle is the Sprite that matched the Color Kid.
For the banner I cut out onesies and rainbow letters that “Welcome Baby” as the parents had not decided on a name yet. For the banner spacers I used images of a few Rainbow Brite characters on the onesies.
At the last shower we threw (for a different cousin) we gave these Cookie-in-a-Jar gifts, and everyone said they made wonderful cookies. So we decided to do it again. We made 40 of them….
Luckily my mom had tons of rainbow-colored fabric to use on the lids. We decided to use mini M&M‘s, instead of chocolate chips, because they were the most rainbow like candy. The tags I made using my Silhouette and I was able to print on both sides of the tags. The back has the instructions for baking.
My most favorite decoration was the rainbow backdrop on the food table.
I still love looking at pictures of the backdrop.
Remember all those circles I sewed together? This is where they ended up. Looks great huh?
We tried to stick to the rainbow theme with the food as well.
Luckily Mother Nature loves colors as much as we do. The two bowls of marshmallows are the clouds that border the fruit rainbow. And of course there is a bowl of Skittles on the table.
We wanted to make a diaper cake, and just in time, SVG Cuts came out with this Tiny Miracle kit that had a diaper castle. Rainbow Brite’s castle was yellow and had rounded tops, not pointed ones. If I had more time, I might have tried to adjust the tops, but the castle still looked great as it was.
Although I didn’t take pictures of the food tent labels, they also matched the rainbow theme.
My sister made these wonderful rainbow cupcakes. To which I added the cupcake toppers with all the characters.
I also made the mom-to-be a souvenir invitation and framed it for her. My mom had a couple of dolls, that belonged to my nieces, so we added them to the decor.
My sister made some gluten-free chocolate cupcakes and some that were rainbow inside.
Oh, so yummy!
And of course here is my cousin in all her pregnant glow!
The guests played present bingo, when mom-to-be opens a present, you get to mark in on a Bingo card. It is a fun way to get everyone involved in the presents and we play it at all our showers.
My cousin was just thrilled when she came and saw the theme and all the decorations. Her baby girl has since arrived and everyone is doing wonderfully.
As adults we have fully come to understand and value teachers.
Growing up we had bad ones, ones we didn’t like, ones that might not have liked us and we had great ones.
But as an adult with kids we can fully understand the difficulty teachers face everyday trying to get our kids to learn.
How do you gets kids interested? How do you keep their attention? How do you explain super complicated things in ways they understand? How do you make them sit still and listen? How do you keep up with all the academic rules, regulation & bureaucracy? But above all how do you not lose your desire to teach?
I don’t have the answers. But I do know that as parents we need to take the extra step to let our children’s teacher know that we care.
Not only do we care about our children’s education, but we care about those that are providing it. We need to give them a little thanks.
This year Teacher Appreciation Week is May 5-9. So get on Pinterest, or Google and find an idea for a nice homemade gift or card. Or just reach out with a call or an email. Tell those who spend so much time with our kids trying to better their lives that we appreciate all they do.
I helped celebrate some teachers at my nieces’ school with these decorations. The PTSO (Parent Teacher Student Organization) got the teacher dinner and dessert during conference days. My sister (who was on the PTSO for her girls’ school) and I decorated the break room where the food was set out.
I Tri and Craft 