Crochet Christmas Ornaments

 Crafting has always been a part of the Christmas season in our house. Ornaments and decorations are some of our favorite projects. Mandy and I are hosting ornament classes at our local knit shop this year. And I thought I would share the patterns with all of you.

The pattern for the lovely star above is HERE. 

 This granny square style tree is HERE.

 And this darling wreath is HERE. I love the construction, it is double layer.

 Another classic ornament based on a granny square. Pattern is HERE.

 This ornament is a classic around our house, one of the first projects I made. The pattern is HERE.

And one of my favorites! This super Simple Snowflake (HERE) is only two rows and can be whipped up in no time. 

Happy Crocheting!

Easy Co-worker Present Ideas

It is that time again Christmas present season.  It is always hard trying to figure out what to make or get for your co-workers to say hey I like working with you but not breaking the bank.  This year I made two different things for co-workers.  

The quick and easy gift was cute little pumpkin bread!  

I found these neat single use baking pans with a lid!  They were at my local Target for about $4.  (I am not affiliated with or being paid/given anything by the companies listed in this post.  I just am trying to make it easier for you to find the products I am talking about.  I like the items in this post and am passing it along to you.  All opinions in this article are my own.)  I just used one Pillsbury Pumpkin Quick Bread mix and it filled up all the pans.  

It was super quick and easy.  All I had to do was reduce the cooking time by a few minutes and Bam Christmas presents!

The next gift was a bit more involved still cheap because I had all the ingredients. However it was more time consuming as I made the cookies from scratch.  

I made these little boxes of cookies but this year I only iced the top ones and then added icing dipping cups!  This is the best idea I have had in awhile.  It cut down on the icing or decorating time and I could add more than one layer of cookies without them sticking together. 

One little thing I did was use my Mug Cookie Cutter from World Market.  Because I chilled the dough overnight they really seemed hold their shape while baking.  Definitely a cookie cutter to use again.

 

Christmas sign

Hello!  I wanted to share my first Christmas project of the season with you today. 

I have been looking at the projects on Pinterest and ran across a cute Christmas sign.  One of the things I love the most about Pinterest is it allows you to find things that are older and would otherwise be hidden. Check out the cute sign from The Winthrop Chronicles from 2012.

How to make a close enough copy!

(Side note: I picked up the majority of these items from Hobby Lobby.  I am in no way affiliated with any of the companies, brands or stores listed.  I just happen to shop there or like their products!)

First I gathered all my supplies:

Board -- foundation of sign

Christmas lights -- these are battery pack operated

Chip board word

Glitter -- extra fine

White acrylic paint

Mod Podge

Paint brush -- for paint and Mod Podge

Things I found out I needed

Double stick tape --  to attach word

Something to contain the glitter

Q-tips -- to paint the inside of the word

Paper plate -- to put paint on

Upholstery Nails -- To hook my lights on

First I painted my word white on the front and sides.  The back got a bit of paint but only when I was smoothing things down.

After the paint dried and my brush had been cleaned out and dried I applied Mod Podge to the top of the letter and poured glitter on it.  It worked wonderfully well.  I just lightly tapped it to knock off the excess but the majority of the glitter stuck!

Here is the finished word after it dried.

Then I realized I would need to attach everything to the board.  This is when I picked up some double stick removable poster tape and upholstery nails.  I decided to use the tape because I am hoping it will give me the option to change the word later to make it a year round sign.

I taped the word on cutting the tape to the right size to fit behind the letters without being seen.  The nails I just held up my lights to determine where they would go.  Then I nailed them in to hang the lights on and to wrap the cord around to hold the battery pack.  I ended up taping the battery pack to the board as well.

Here is the finished sign unlit.  I love the cute star lights!

Here is one where the lights are on.  The picture does not show how awesome it looks!  I only had my camera phone for pictures.

And here it is hanging in its new home in my crafting/studio space!

This was a super simple project that took about an hour to put together.  

What Christmas crafts are you working on?

Make A Christmas Wreath

 

I saw a fabulous idea at the craft store and have been slowly collecting pieces here and there to make these wreaths. I didn't want to spend six dollars for each grapevine circle so I went to the dollar store and found wicker wreaths, they only cost a dollar each of course. I waited for a buy-one get-one free sale at the craft store to get the greenery and dug through the clearance basket to get ribbon for fifty cents. I put off making these wreaths until almost the last minute, I was sure they were going to be time consuming and difficult... To make six of them it took me less than 2 hours. They really are easy!

I love this idea of decorating chairs in the dining room, because the only other place to really decorate is a centerpiece on the table which tends to interfere with the food. Just think, you could make a wreath for any holiday, just be creative!

 

First, I cut the greenery into desireable pieces and wove in the berries, then hot glued them in place.

 

Next, I wrapped sheer gold ribbon around the wreath, it was a wide ribbon and covered too much greenery so I simply folded it in half as I wrapped, and listened to Christmas carols of course.

 

Then, I cut red satin ribbon and sheer sparkly ribbon into even lengths to be the ties for the chairs.

Now we are all ready fo a Christmas feast!

Hold onto your hats-Its a Gingerbread House Contest!

Yes indeed! We decided to create gingerbread houses and enter the King Arthur Flour Gingerbread Contest.  You can see the other entrants to the contest on Pintrest. We haven't made them in years, I forgot how much work they were!

 "No. 4 Gumdrop Lane"

 This is Mandy's creation where she went crazy with gumdrops. Flattened gumdrops for the path........

.......... rolled gumdrops for shingles

 .........even gumdrops on the chimney (which are actually Dot candies rolled into sugar, because we ran out of red and green gumdrops!)

And gumdrop trees! These are leftover rolled gumdrops shaped into cones.

 And this is "Peppermint Cottage", my little creation.

 I stuck with a classic look, frosting and peppermints!

A few notes on gingerbread construction- we used our favorite gingerbread recipe rolled extra thick. For glue and decorating royal frosting made in different consistencies.

There is still time to join the fun!, the contest doesn't end until Dec 31!

Christmas Fruitcake

The secret to our Christmas Fruitcake? Fresh cranberries!!

Not only do they look pretty, but taste so much better then those brightly colored odd bits of fruit traditionly put in fruitcakes. When we tell people that we make fruitcake, the first response is "I don't like it, all that weird fruit".

 Even lovers of fruitcake are a little put off by it sometimes. The main reason we started using other fruit, (besides the ick factor) was the food dye, it doesn't agree with me. So we set out to create a cake that tasted good, might be a bit more healthy for you (fresh fruit versus processed) and didn't give me hives. We took out all the stuff we didn't like and put in REAL yummy fruit. 

Fresh cranberries, fresh apples, dried pineapple, dates, raisins, dried mango and walnuts.

For this batch we were a little shy on dried fruits. But fruitcake is forgiving. Whatever you have on hand works!

We like ours chock full of fruit, about half fruit and half batter! After all, that is the point of a fruitcake right?

The batter is a little light in color as we ran out of brown sugar. Yes, it was almost a crisis! But then I remembered that white sugar + molasses = brown sugar! We just measured out the amount of sugar we needed (well, maybe we didn't measure, just threw a bunch in a bowl), added molasses and mixed until it looked like brown sugar!

As you can see we like to use a lot of different sized pans. Cupcake sized for gifts, small loaves for stashing in the freezer and large round cakes for Christmas Day! (Did I mention fruitcake freezes great? We love it half frozen!)

 

Christmas Fruit Cake

1 1/2 cups butter

3 cups brown sugar

6 eggs

3/4 tsp baking powder

3 cups flour

1 cup raisins

1 cup chopped dates

1 cup dried pineapple

1 cup other dried fruits such as kiwi, papaya, mango, passion fruit (optional)

1 1/2 cups chopped apple

1 1/2 (12 oz) bags fresh or frozen cranberries

1 cup walnuts

Mix all dried and fresh fruit in a bowl. Stir 1 cup of flour into fruit and set aside. In large bowl cream together butter and sugar, then add eggs. Mix in flour and baking powder. Fold fruit mixture into batter. Bake in greased pans at 275 degrees for about 35-45 mins.

 

Are you a lover of fruitcake or a non-lover? What do you like or dislike?