When Carter and Lydia were little-little, I wrote monthly letters to them.
(Unfortunately, I haven’t kept that up with that.)

When they got a little older, I had books that I made called:
“The World According to Carter” (or Lydia, as the case may be).
Whenever they would say something amusing or interesting, I’d jot it down in there.

(I’ve done neither for Asa or Anna Alden.
I have scraps of paper shoved in a box with notes.
That has to count for something, right?)

And then somewhere out on the wild, wild web I saw an idea that I loved:
A mom talked about starting a shared journal with her teenage daughter.
Things they couldn’t say a loud somehow managed to find its way into the notebook.
When I saw that I decided to tuck that away into my memory bank for ‘someday’.

That is…until last week.
I was cleaning out a big box of papers that all belonged to my children.
Mixed in with the lists of sight words and hoot owl art work,
I found hundreds upon hundreds of little slips of paper.
Most of them said To: (Insert Family Member’s Name Here)

My children, like most children, love to create masterpieces and do.not. want to throw anything away.
I want to keep some of their art, but oh, my!  That’s a looooot of paper!
So while I was sitting in the middle of the floor and sorting papers,
I decided it would be nice to have one spot for all this.

And I remembered the mother-daughter notebook.
I could make a notebook for each child and they could write or draw in it to me.
And I, too, could write or draw in it to them.

So I picked up some composition notebooks, pulled out my scrapbook paper and mod podge and got to work!

I had a 12×12 sheet of scrapbook paper that wouldn’t cover the front and the back, but I wanted to cover the spine, too.
So I cut it so that the top is completely covered and the back is partially covered(seen below).
Then I cut it out, slapped down a layer of mod podge(you could probably use regular glue) and smoothed out the paper.

I wanted to label my book, so I used some scrapbook stickers to spell out “mommy & me”.
But the letters were blending in a little too much with the paper so I outlined them with a fine tipped black sharpie.

And then because my Lydia is the Bling Queen, I decided to add some jewels.
All I did was hot glue them on (and burn my finger tip once).

I can’t wait to see what stories will be told and pictures will be drawn.
I am so excited about this idea!

And I’m actually considering making a few for some friends, too.
You could mail it back and forth…like old-fashioned pen pals!  🙂
(It’s cheesy, but you know you love it, too.)

*******
12 Crafts of Christmas 2011
1. Personalized Necklaces
2. Button and Lego Wall Art
3. Personalized ClipBoards
4. Fabric Covered Wire(Wall Art) 
5. Stationary
6. You & Me Books
7. Personalized Welcome Mat
8. Personalized Dessert Carrier
9. Kid’s Artwork Cup
10. Ornaments
11. Sewing Tutorials
12. Photo Display Block

A while back, I saw this idea in Family Fun magazine.
I kept meaning to try it, but never ended up with the time or resources.

A few weeks after I saw it, my friend Jesse told me that she’d seen the same thing.
Only she actually made it and I just thought about making one.

So tonight I sat down and started working on these.
They don’t take long, but they are addictive!

I was planning on doing just one and ended up doing 5!

Soooo…you’ll need some kind of thick-ish wire.  (I had some 14 gauge galvanized wire left over from another project.)
A pair of wire cutters and a pair of pliers.  And fabric scraps.

For the first one, I wanted to make something Christmas-y, so I bent the top part of the wire into a star shape and then just zig-zagged the rest of the way down.  (Mine is about 10″ tall.)

Then I tied one piece of my ribbon onto the wire and started just wrapping and wrapping and wrapping.
When you get to the end of your piece of fabric, just tie on another one and keep going (making sure to wrap up the knot you just made).

Once I had wrapped up the entire thing and tie off the end, I cut smaller bits of multi-colored fabric and added “ornaments” to my tree.

And as if it wasn’t late enough last night (about 1am), I decided that I had to make something else.
So I made a little wire flower to match Anna Alden’s room.  (I think I may make a bunch of them and put them on her walls.)

And then I was on a roll and thought, “I should make a monogram one!”
So I did:

What other designs can you think of?
I was thinking a Mickey Mouse would be cute.
Or do the whole alphabet and put it on the wall.
Gosh, y’all!  I better go buy more wire.

*******
12 Crafts of Christmas 2011
1. Personalized Necklaces
2. Button and Lego Wall Art
3. Personalized ClipBoards
4. Fabric Covered Wire(Wall Art) 
5. Stationary
6. You & Me Books
7. Personalized Welcome Mat
8. Personalized Dessert Carrier
9. Kid’s Artwork Cup
10. Ornaments
11. Sewing Tutorials

When I first saw these on Pinterest, I knew that I would be making at least one as a Christmas gift.
I l.o.v.e. the way they turned out.

And you only need a few things: a canvas (this is 8×10), legos or buttons or beads, paint, paint brush, glue gun

For the girl one, I used left-over paint from Carter and Lydia’s room re-do last year.
For the other one, I used some old red paint I already had.
When the paint was almost dry, I gently applied a liiiiiitle bit of white to give it a little distressed look.
(You could, of course, leave the background one solid color.)
(Or mod podge on some scrapbook paper or fabric.)

I initially only planned on doing a cutesty girl one (hence the jewels in the above picture that didn’t make the cut),
But decided that you could easily do a boy one with something like Legos or tiny plastic bugs or coins.

After the paint was completely dry, I laid out all my pieces onto the canvas.

For the flower button one,
I figured out where I wanted everything to go and I hot glued it into place.

For the lego one,
I started by gluing the legos directly to the canvas, but couldn’t get it straight enough.
So I decided to hot glue the pieces together and then glue the whole thing onto the canvas.

I am so excited about these!  Aren’t you?

What other materials might you use?

*******
12 Crafts of Christmas 2011
1. Personalized Necklaces
2. Button and Lego Wall Art
3. Personalized ClipBoards
4. Fabric Covered Wire(Wall Art) 
5. Stationary
6. You & Me Books
7. Personalized Welcome Mat
8. Personalized Dessert Carrier
9. Kid’s Artwork Cup
10. Ornaments
11. Sewing Tutorials
12. Photo Display Block

In October of last year, I started a little series here called “12 Crafts of Christmas” where I showcased a idea or two each of the 12 weeks prior to Christmas.  I knew I wanted to do it again this year, but when October came I wasn’t anywhere near having my act together.  I was just trying to make it to Halloween with all 4 children healthy.  (We made it!)  But I still wanted to do 12 crafts, so I have decided to do two crafts a week for the next six weeks.

Today’s craft is a little jewelry tutorial.  I did originally see this idea on Pinterest and it was linked to a tutorial.
But sometimes I see people post things that they’ve made and I think, “It can’t really be that easy, can it?”
This was one of those times, and I’m here to tell you: This is seriously easy, but it does take a little patience.

For this project you will need:
A hammer     

Ribbon

Jewelry bead

Sharpie

Wet wipes

Scissors

Fray Check

A steel stamp set like this one from Harbor Freight.

Metal Washers (I bought three sizes starting with 1/4″ and going up)

Start by placing the washer on a flat and sturdy surface.
(I would not recommend doing this on your kitchen table!)
Using the letters of the stamp set, carefully hammer in the letters you want to use.
(Be sure that the letters aren’t facing backwards before you hammer!)

Once you are finished hammering, use a Sharpie to color over the letters.
Make sure the ink gets down into the grooves.
Before it gets too dry, gently wipe off the excess with a wet wipe.

Thread the ribbon through the washer(s) from front to back (as shown).
Push the ribbon through the hole created and tighten.
Add jewelry bead to secure the spot of the knot.
Trim the ends of the ribbon and then use FrayCheck to keep it from unraveling.

For these necklaces, I simply tie a bow in the back.
But if you really wanted to, you could easily add a clasp.

See, wasn’t that easy?  I will admit that I threw away several washers that I ruined at first.
It takes a little practice to get used to lining up the letters and hitting it just hard enough.
Over all, it took me about 10 minutes to make one necklace.

***

Want a fancier version of this necklace?  Click here to see how to add a pearl.

Want to make a bird nest necklace?  Click here to find out how.

Want something with a little less sparkle?  How about these tee shirt bracelets?

*******
12 Crafts of Christmas 2011
1. Personalized Necklaces
2. Button and Lego Wall Art
3. Personalized ClipBoards
4. Fabric Covered Wire(Wall Art) 
5. Stationary
6. You & Me Books
7. Personalized Welcome Mat
8. Personalized Dessert Carrier
9. Kid’s Artwork Cup
10. Ornaments
11. Sewing Tutorials
12. Photo Display Block