clay gift tags.

The gift making craftiness has begun. It is time for list making, gathering supplies, and making. The boys love making things too. One of the things we started this week is gift tags. We change it up from year to year, and this year decided to make some using air dry clay. It is a really simple process and the variations and possibilities are really endless.


For this first round we rolled out air dry clay fairly thinly and G picked out some stamps. Using a napkin ring (it was the perfect size we needed - you can also use cookie cutters of any shape you like) we cut out circles.


G then took a skewer and pierced a hole in the top of each one. He then stamped them. He did one batch that he stamped "a gift for you" and he added some little embellishments with other stamps around the edge for texture. Stamp words, names, designs, whatever you want.


We let them dry for 2 days. The first day they dried stamp up. We then flipped them over to dry a bit on back too.


You can use them as is - the white clay looks nice. Or, you can paint. We wanted an earthy look to go with some of our tea blend gifts, so we squirt a dab of gold acrylic paint on each disc, made sure the paint was in the sunken stamped areas, and then gently brushed/rubbed with a sponge brush to remove most of the paint from the surface (don't forget the back and edges), leaving the low lying words filled with darker paint. G finished a few dozen happily painting and brushing. Let dry. They look earthy and beautiful and are great for hand made gifts.

You can insert ribbon, raffia or twine through the hole and tie onto your gift. You can leave more generic or you can use the back of the disc to write a name (a paint pen works great). We are planning on making a few more batches of them since they look so nice - some that are long and skinny with stamped names going down the front, as well as a few other shapes/variations with stamps (snowflake, leaf, star). Love it!

busy-ness.

After the blizzard comes the cold, and so we have had an awesome week mostly at home but for the quick outings to karate, the library, or to play in the snow (the roads are horrible and I hurt my back, so I'm very happy staying close!).


When the temps get really frigid the sun comes out and I love how the winter sun in the windows always gets us going and energized. The boys have had a few days of busy busy!


So much energy, so much intensity and focus - love it!



We have had board games, math games, researching, riddles, drawing and painting.


Card making, cookie baking, lots of icing and sprinkles, vintage holiday specials.


Wax molding (snails! reptiles!), snap circuits, money math, bird feeders and Pokémon.


Darts, gift making and wrapping, food chopping, anagrams, and clove-clementine pomanders.


UV experiments, black light tests, chess (or should I say beating mom in chess), LEGO, and dancing.


Tons of books, magnet experiments, leather wallet making, letter writing, Irish history and so much more!


So.much.more.


We are waiting for a few last packages to arrive so we can finish all of the last bits of gift making - until then I see more games, numbers, experiments and books in my future! Happy Thursday!!

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clay tea light holders.

Over the past few weeks G has been making tea light holders with me out of air dry clay. We started by making a few as a test to see how it worked and turned out. It is quite simple and anything to do with clay is good with G.


We started by taking an air dry clay (we like this one) and rolling it into a ball - about palm size. We then took a tea light and pushed it into the middle firmly, until it was even on the bottom and pushed it around sideways a little to be sure there was extra room for the tea light to go back in when it dried. G dipped his fingers into water and smoothed around the tea light a little bit.

We let them dry a few days with the tea light still in it, and then took it out, turned over the now mostly dry clay, and let the bottom dry too.


G painted the clay with a craft acrylic paint - we found one that said it was for ceramics and was shiny. He did two coats.


Once that was dry he took a brush and dabbed glue on the holders and then sprinkled glitter on that to stick. After they were all dry we lit them! G loves the sparkles in the candlelight.


They look nice and festive. We are making some more with different colors/shapes and less glitter for gifts.

To make the clay base even it does require working together with little ones more closely in the first molding phase, but the painting and decorating is no holds barred! :) Fun!

candle decorating.

One of the crafts the boys enjoy repeating is decorating our pillar candles for each season. It is simple, but the decorated candles look nice and add to our nature or dinner table!


We have a few sets of the small cookie cutters which we use for wax and clay. We use them a LOT. For our fall candles, the boys picked nice fall colors and cut shapes out of embellishing beeswax - they picked leaves and acorns.


We then simply press the beeswax shapes onto the candles - warm the shapes up a tad bit between your hands before pressing the pieces on and it will stick. You only need a light bond. If your hands don't do the trick, I hold a match to the back of a piece to warm it a little (*quickly* - don't melt it!) before my son presses it on. When the holiday or season has passed, if your candle remains, you can simply remove the wax pieces and decorate for the next season! Decorating plain pillars also makes a nice gift.

Melt and Pour Soap.

These extra days with dad at home means more time for being at home with family, playing games, running in the snow, baking, and doing fun craft projects. Today we made our first batch of melt and pour soap for gifts. It turned out great.

We started with a good quality olive oil glycerin soap base, good quality essential oil, soap molds, a large glass measuring cup, olive oil, and a wooden stir stick.

First, the boys took a dab of olive oil and rubbed the molds carefully, coating the entire surface so that it won't stick.


We then chopped the melt and pour base into smaller chunks (mom helps) and put the chunks into the measuring cup. The blocks were heated in the microwave for 45 seconds to start (stir), and then at 15 second intervals (stir) until full melted.


Gently stir in essential oils -- we used 1-2 drops per ounce of base. Today it was peppermint. Let it sit for a minute -- get your molds ready.

Carefully pour the base into the molds. My boys did help pour, but I held onto the pouring hand the whole time to be sure we didn't spill or splatter. Let sit for at least an hour to harden. Gently press the backside of the molds to pop out the soap.


This was our first batch so we did not use any color or texture additions. The clear olive oil base with the fresh minty smell is wonderful and they will look perfect packaged in a beautiful red organza bag (working on sewing those!), tied with a white ribbon (a la candy cane).

This ended up being a great project for the boys...they did help (although much was closely working with a grown up hand), they liked watching and participating in the process, and they LOVE LOVE LOVE seeing the result. And of course we have even more beautiful handmade gifts to give for the holidays. For our next batch, I think we may try some other fragrances, natural colorings, and maybe even some dried herbs!

Library Bag.

I finished the first of many library bag gifts yesterday. This first one is a bit smaller - not for the guerrilla warrior library haul like we have each visit - but for the person who picks up just a few books. The straps are long, which I like, and there is a pocket inside for a library card.

This will be given with a good book tucked inside.

I plan to sew several of these for gifts - of different sizes, some including a media pocket.

It is that time again!

Can you feel it coming? The last push of crafting, sewing, creating, making (and repeating) of hand crafted gifts for the holidays?

I always try to not be *that* relative that gives crazy homemade things that no one would ever want or use. I try to be the *wow* relative that gives handmade/homemade things that look like they match each personality and that people keep and carry/use happily (or eat and really enjoy). This year I have a nice list of things to make. My biggest challenge each year is to find creative things to make for men and kids - the gals are pretty easy. I think I have some cool ideas this time - we'll see how it goes.

I have been collecting fabric all summer/fall, and have recently added to my stash. I have some specific plans for the batch shown above - I'm itching to start.

Anyone else making gifts this year? What?