Wooden Christmas Garland

Decorating for Christmas is something I look forward to all year-storing things away that I collect throughout the changing seasons-until I feel that first nippy bite in the air.
One of my neighbor’s had their visiting father-who I have come to adore-knock on my door this past spring. It was no surprise that he came to me with a stack of cedar chunks from a felled tree.
And to quote the father (with a severe southern drawl), “When I saw these, I just knew if anyone could do something with them, it’d be you.”
Apparently, my reputation precedes me….

And I hope I haven’t let him down or failed his expectations of just what I could “do with them”. For next to nothing, I have a unique garland made from reclaimed cedar wood that Anthropologie is probably jealous of…or at least, I’d like to think so.
I’ll be sharing the tutorial on how to make the cute little blue, brown & red trees next week.

 

Here’s what you’ll need to make your very own Wooden Christmas Garland:
Chunks ‘o Wood (mine were about 9″ in diameter)
Rope (I used 1/2 twisted nylon rope-blue hawk is a pretty good brand from Lowe’s)
Palm Sander and 80+ grit Sandpaper
Your favorite color paint/spray paint
Hammer & nails (not pictured)
Stencils
Blue Tape

Let’s get started!

 

Lightly sand the wood, going with the grain if possible. I sanded mine just enough to not have burrs or splinters. I wanted my garland to be rustic.

 

Choose your saying. I went with “Peace”, but considered “Boink”, “Poop”, and “Elephant”. I really didn’t have enough wood to do the latter and was outvoted on the first two by my visiting mother-in-law.

Tape down the stencils with blue tape, adding scrap paper if needed to protect the rest of the wood.

 

Spray away! I went with two coats, just to be safe.

 

Remove the stencils. Stand back. Ooh and ahh until the neighbor gets curious. Then tell them to quit snooping, this is a top secret project.

 

I gave the wood a light coating with a Crystal Clear Enamel, but you don’t have to. You could also add a layer of polyurethane instead. Either acts as a protectant and gives the wood a little sheen.
The “P” has been sprayed with it in this picture, but not the “E”.

 

Spray paint your rope, if you so desire. I went with shiny, shiny gold. I like gold things-they’re kingly.

 

Once everything is dry, use your hammer and small nails to tack in the rope to the back of the wood. I used two nails per chunk of wood.

 

Hang your Wooden Christmas Garland where your little heart desires and enjoy.
Then call your neighbor to tell them you just finished your top secret project and you also have some warm cookies to share.
I bet they’ll be over in two shakes of a kitty’s tail.

DIY Family Board Game

Our families both appreciate hand-made gifts for Christmas-especially if the gifts are not of the socks or underwear variety.
So, when it came close to Christmas, Biceps and I decided to make a DIY Family Board Game for each side of our families.

The family loved it-who doesn’t like to hear questions asked about themselves?-and it has become a tradition to play our game together, adding new cards each year. I’ll show you around the game and then give you a step by step tutorial on how to do it yourself!

 

We personalized the entire game by creating question cards that pertain specifically to our family using old stories, funny memories and anything that might embarrass each one of us.

 

We harvested old family photos and glued them to the board, using street names from our hometown to guide the way around the board.

 

We also personalized game pieces that are meaningful to our family-my dad swears every year that the Christmas tree grows on the way home from the forest and he also can put away two ginormous bowls of popcorn in one sitting.

 

We then decorated the box with stickers and photos, recalling yesteryears of campfires, sleeping bag rides and such other childhood awesomeness.

 

And of course, a very specific set of rules was implemented by the one and only rule giver-Biceps.
I don’t need no stinkin’ rules.
The rules are pretty simple-divide into two teams, one team draws a question card, but only one member of that team gets to answer the question. If they answer correctly, they roll the dice and move that many spaces. Then the next team goes.
BUT-if you land on a “Launchpad” (a photo along the path), you get to double your roll the next go around.
Pretty simple. Except Biceps threw in a bunch of more rules…he is such a rule monger…

 

It was a rather simple process to make the game and a bonus was the miniscule financial investment. Like $4.00 or so. The whole idea was a real win-win.
Now since you have witnessed all of this DIY Family Board Game-let me tell you how I made it!

Here’s what you’ll need to make your very own board game:
An old, neglected board game (I don’t understand Parcheesi, so it was sacrificed)
15-20 sheets of Card Stock (for the question cards, I used gray)
4-6 Sheets of Card Stock (to cover the board, I used a light tan)
Rubber Cement
Markers
Old Family Photos
Stickers (optional)

To play the game:
Game Pieces (I used a mini tree and popcorn box I already had on hand and hot glued it to a penny)
Dice
Timer (I bought mine at a educational supply store for $3)
Playdough (not pictured-it dried out because of inadequate lid tightening and I need to buy some new ‘dough. Deal with it.)

 

Rubber Cement the card stock to the game board. Pay heed to the folds in the board and cut your card stock accordingly.

 

Once the board is covered and the rubber cement is dry, cut out family photos to decorate the board with. These photos became our “launchpad”-meaning, if you landed on them you got some sort of bonus roll/move.

 

Glue your photos down, making a definitive “START” and “STOP”.

 

In between the “START” & “STOP”, create a meandering and colorful path around the board, spicing up the path with the occasional photo (Launchpad).

 

Now, paint, cover with a fabric or whatever decor you desire to the outside of the game’s box. Add additional stickers, sayings, or more photos that mean something to you and yours.

 

Here is an example of our rule sheet printed out on card stock. They are your typical multiple player board game rules with specifics thrown in for our family.
You may copy these rules for yourself, make up your own, or just make them up as you go along-that could get exciting.

 

Up until now, things have been smooth sailing for you. Now comes the slightly more difficult task of creating questions. We tried to make sure our questions had a specific answer, were known by most family members, and slightly obtuse.
For example, instead of: “What is Grandpa’s first name?”
Asking: “What was Grandpa called as a boy following a disturbing fishing incident?”

We also added another twist-kind’ve a “wild card” known as “Sock-Fight!” on my family’s side and “Breaker-Breaker!” on Bicep’s side. These “wild card’s” cause a head to head challenge with the other team. If you beat them at a skill; drawing, sculpting or charades, you get to go again. If you don’t beat them, you loose your turn.

We spent a long time collaborating on the questions, re-wording, re-writing, making a template on my computer and then printing them off onto the card stock. (Someone is a perfectionist-but I won’t name any names). I then skipped over to a copy center and used their cutting machines to make each card precisely the same size- 2 1/4 x 2 1/4.

 

And that, my dears, was our DIY Family Board Game. The family loves it because it’s about them. I love it because it’s become a family heirloom that is added to each year with a marriage, a birth, or just another embarrassing moment.
As far as homemade gifts, this one was a dead-ringer.

Arts & Crap Changes!

I’m back!
Sing it from the mountain tops! After 8 months of being gone from the blogging world, I am finally back up and running. I didn’t choose to be away, fate chose it for me. It was a rough loss for me back in January when my blog failed via the platform, Iweb.

If I could cut Iweb in two, I would.
Or at least pinky shear the programmer’s button up short sleeved shirts.

I had built the site myself in Iweb and for some reason, after a year of blogging with that platform, Iweb decided it had had enough. The ability to update my site, add posts, change anything, was a distant memory.

I pinched my pennies for several months and hired a web designer to build my site (correctly) for me. Once the framework was in place, I had the duties of importing all of my old posts-a task that required copy and pasting each bit of text, each picture, each title…you get the idea. I lost some of my “pretties”, but sacrifices had to be made.

I have a few exciting things to catch you up on from my eight months of absence. I’ll be expanding on each of these items over the next couple of months. But, I thought you’d like a bit of an overview to wet the ol appetite.

So, here are a few changes that have gone on since you last heard from me:

I planted my first full-fledged garden this year. The harvest included, but is not limited to: green beans, spinach, tomatoes, dill, basil, zucchini, yellow squash, potatoes, red and white onions, carrots and tons of peppers…
I’ll share with you some organic and natural ways to keep pests away from your garden, ways to improve the quality of your soil and cheap things you can use to stake up your plants.

I, with the help of Biceps, built a composter for my garden-one that spins ’round and round. It’s a lot of fun to watch it go “round and round”….and to watch it help my plants grow big and strong. I save all of the kitchen scraps and yard waste, throw it in the barrel and give it a push. I’ll teach you how to make your very own.

I also made two rain barrels to capture the water running off of our roofs. Did you know that 1″ of rain on an average sized roof (1500 sq ft) can equal 900 gallons of usable water? That’s a lot of water….

There’s plenty more where that came from, but no need to cram everything in. I’ll be sharing with you each of these tutorials with step-by-step instructions, along with pretty photos.

I am ecstatic to be back in the saddle again. The crafting saddle, that is.

Homemade Paper & Stationary Sets

I love writing thank you notes-real notes in my handwriting using a pen and a piece of paper.
Not an email, a texts or a tweets. A note that comes in an envelope with a stamp on it.

There’s only one thing better than a handwritten thank you note.

A handmade and handwritten thank you note.

This process takes less than an hour to do, plus dry time, and provides an impressive finished product. Let’s get started on making some fancy stationary, shall we?

Here’s what you’ll need to make your very own stationary:

A picture frame (I made mine from scrap lumber)
Blender
Sponge
Window Screen as large as the frame
Recycled paper, construction paper, newspaper, etc
Dried Flowers (If desired)
Paper Towels and Hand towels
Envelopes
Staple Gun
Utility Knife
A plastic bin larger than the frame (I used my sink, instead)

Begin by stapling the screen to the backside of your picture frame. Make sure the screen is securely attached. Over-do it, I give you permission.

Tear the paper into pieces about 2″ or smaller. Fill your blender with the paper, but don’t compress the paper. Add water until the blender is about 2/3 full.

Press the ‘pulse’ button several times to get the mixture going. Then, switch to ‘puree’, until the mixture has almost a smoothie consistency. I did this process several times to create enough of the mixture for the amount of paper I wanted to make.

Fill your plastic bin or in my case, my sink, with the mixture, adding water until it is about 4″ deep. I added enough water to my sink until the consistency resembled more of a soup like texture.

Dip your frame into the mixture, with the top of the frame facing up. Pull the frame out of the water slowly, allowing it to drain. You can even rest the frame on your bin to allow it to drain longer.

Add your dried flowers to the topside of the paper at this point.

Lay out hand towels and place several paper towels on top of them.

Flip your frame over on top of the paper towels. Allow the paper to release itself from the screen slowly. Use a sponge to gently remove as much excess water that you can from the paper. Allow the paper to dry for several hours.

Once the paper is dry, tear it by hand to fit the size of envelopes that you have. Save any scraps to be used as name tags for the final product.

I made a stationary ‘set’ out of four pieces of the homemade paper with four envelopes. I then decorated the sets with scrap ribbon and ric-rac that I had on hand, adding buttons on a couple for a little extra ‘wow’ factor.

I used the scrap pieces of my homemade paper as name tags to accompany the sets.

My homemade stationary sets were a big hit with the family-or so they told me. I choose to believe them.