Re-purposed Glass Jars, Great for Xmas Gifts!

Every year my moms group hosts a cookie swap right around Christmas time, and its always a lot of fun! Part of the fun is packaging your cookies in a festive and creative way. Of course I also try to think of frugal, green ways to go about doing this.

This year I used old glass jars. Mainly jars that use to hold salsa, peanut butter, and dip. Re-purposing glass jars is a great way to "package" any homemade gift. This is how simple it is: rinse out the jar and peel the label off as must as possible. Then use acetone to remove the rest of the label and any glue. Next boil the jar and lid for a few minutes to sanitize. After that I ran the jar threw my dishwasher, just for the extra clean.

Decide how you would like to decorate your jars. All I used was scrapbook paper I already had, mod podge, and jute.

I put Holiday M&Ms in the bottom of the jars to give it a little more of a festive look. Then added my cookies. The jars (and Pecan Cups) were a huge hit.

The Real Count Down to Christmas is ON!

Even though I've been counting down to Christmas since August! This is my absolute favorite time of the year! The thing I like the most has to be advent calenders. There are so many different ways out there to do advent calenders. This is the one we use that I made three years ago:

 

Here's a close up.

Each day has a little tag in it with a different activity to do. My kids love this so much that come January they are still asking me what the activity of the day is. This gives my family a way to do all the Christmas traditions we love and keeps us organized at the same time.

 A great craft blog that I love to read ( C.R.A.F.T. ) has rounded up a bunch of creative advent calenders. Check them out at Advent Calender Roundup #1, Advent Calender Roundup #2, and Advent Calender Roundup #3

My photos

I’m crazy when it comes to my photos. They need to be kept in order by date, with the date the photo was taken written on the back of every photo, and they must be kept in a photo album. Not just any old album either. The binder part of the album must be bound (no ring binders here!) and it needs to be tall enough to hold three photos on either side. My albums must also have a small spot next to each photo to write a little sentence or two about the photo. So it looks like this:

Problem with this is these types of albums are impossible to find with any sort of detail to the cover. I had to put my creativity to the test and come up with something better. I ended up turning a boring, plan album like this
Into this

(I don't like to show pics of my kids. The longer white spot has my son's name spelled out w/ wooden letters)

And this

(just need to fix the beads)

Look for a blog post in the next week or two showing how I personalize my own photo albums!

Toy Box Re-do

I have such a hard time saying no to anything that's free. I figure I can always come up with an idea later. At first when we got this Sponge Bob toy box from a family friend, I had no idea what to do with it. No one in my home is a Sponge Bob fan (that goodness!) My son does love dinosaurs though. So after some thinking, this is what I came up with.



Cost:
~Toy Box: free
~Painter tape: free (already had)
~2 cans spray paint: $6.50
~Dinosaur decals: $10.20 (full price was $17.99, but I had a coupon)
TOTAL: $16.70

Inexpensive Candle Gift

I love this idea. It is a great gift to anyone on your list.

What you need:
White pillar candle
A picture of your choice printed on regular paper
A blow dryer
Wax paper

1. Cut picture to size and place on your white candle

2. Cover candle with wax paper, smooth, and hold tight. I actually taped the wax paper to the back to the candle to help keet it in place.

3. Turn your blow dyer to the hottest setting and hold it over the wax paper positioned over the picture. Within a few minutes the wax paper will start to get a bit shiny.

4. Once all the wax paper covering your picture is shiny, stop using the blow dryer.

5. Wait about a minute to let the candle cool. Then slowly peel away the wax paper and tada! A picture candle!

Here are the candles I did.
I would suggest that if you have a spare glove it should be wore on the hand that will be holding the candle. The first candle I did took forever because my hand kept getting to hot. The next couple candles I did I wore a glove that lost its mate last winter. I was able to do this a lot quicker and without burning my hand.