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I have gone from a very small family to part of a very large family. My boyfriend has 8 brothers and sisters who are all married and most with kids. I am not sure what to do for christmas.
I was thinking about making a (scrapbook) calendar with all of the birthdays and holidays and what not, but I am not sure what I can do with it. We are not rich people since I am a full time student and we have 4 kids of our own lol.
Any suggestions of something that is awesome but fairly cheap as we have a lot of gifts to go around. i am starting now to give myself time lol. Thanks for any suggestions!!
Look under "anything but a card" in the gallery. There are a lot of good ideas in there. One of my favorites is the Christmas Fudge poem wrapped around a big Hershey bar. Another nice gift that people appreciate would be to make some kind of homemade Christmas candy, put it in bags, and make your own tags/labels.
1. I found basic white canvasy frames at Walmart in the scrapbooking section. I stamped a snowflake all over in versamark and embossed in white. Then sponged over it all with night of navy. Then I found a very small snowflake like shape and stamped that in navy. I finished it off with ribbon, a bookplate, and a "title" like family, winter, etc.
2. Starbucks usually carries mugs that you can put your own stamped insert in. They are $11 though, but worth it!!
3. You could do altered large wooden letters in each of the family names.
4. You could do name frames. You could do family names inside the frame or words like welcome, jingle, joy etc.
The calendar is a great idea! Go for smaller 8x8s though... less to embellish!
There are also coasters you make out of the tumbled tiles. I did this for Mother's Day for my MIL-- and I even made a chipboard coaster box to put the coasters in!
You could make a cute calendar out of small acrylic picture frame
Post it note holder with matching pens
Altered journals...
Just tons of possibliites. Just browse the gallery, you'll find more ideas than you'll have time to do them all!!!
I do calendars - last year it was just the calendar, made on chipboard to flip for each month. This year I am going to use the idea in the Stampin Up catalong and do larger sets that include an area to write. These are pretty inexpensive, you use the supplies you have on hand.
I am also thinking of making coaster sets out of chipboard that are more for decoration then use.
But for coasters to use - I was thinking of picking up individual tiles at Home Depot and stamping on them and adding a picture of the grandkids.
Last year I also picked up albums at the dollar store and on clearance at Target - made each page into a month dedication, put a calendar on the front of each page, month specific, and then provided a few cards for each month - an organizer in effect.
Good luck - browse the gallery and you will come up with loads of ideas.
Oh! I just saw the cutest ideas last night in an old issue of Paper Crafts. you might have to give it to them on Dec. 1st instead of Christmas though! Both are "countdown to Christmas" type gifts.
One was a decorated envelope -- but you could use an altered lunch box or box, or expandable check folder thingy -- that contained 25 cards inside. Each card had a little ribbon tab stapled to the card so it was decorative and easy to pull out. The instructions on the envelope said something like, "Do one Christmas activity every day" ... ideas were like "bake Christmas cookies", "go sing Christmas carolls" "wrap presents" ... but you could make up whatever you wanted to customize it to the families, like "secretly shovel a neighbor's walkway", "pick one sibling and treat them like a king/queen for the day", "go out and wish the mail carrier Merry Christmas" etc. You could also change out the ribbon tabs and make them 1-25.
The other idea was a hanging board with 25 hanging round, numbered tags. You remove the tag and on the other side of the tag could be whatever you want it to be ... a surprise, a saying, a bible verse, etc.
As a mom of 3 kids, I would have LOVED someone to give me something that I could pull out and use as an activity count-down kind of thing for my family.
Another idea I had would be to make a family calendar for them, with columns to write down each family member's activities. Or make a family information center (combo corkboard/bulletin board/magnetic board) that they could hang in their kitchen or inside a pantry door.
Last idea I have is to make a "You Are Special" gift that each person in the family would use when it is their birthday. Like a hand-painted plate, a paper-crafted doorknob hanger with a pocket on it that people could leave little notes or treats. My brain is a bit dead right now, but you could run with this idea and come up with a number of items that could be put into a "Your Special Day" box.
__________________
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1. I found basic white canvasy frames at Walmart in the scrapbooking section. I stamped a snowflake all over in versamark and embossed in white. Then sponged over it all with night of navy. Then I found a very small snowflake like shape and stamped that in navy. I finished it off with ribbon, a bookplate, and a "title" like family, winter, etc.
2. Starbucks usually carries mugs that you can put your own stamped insert in. They are $11 though, but worth it!!
3. You could do altered large wooden letters in each of the family names.
4. You could do name frames. You could do family names inside the frame or words like welcome, jingle, joy etc.
5. stamped candles
I could go on, but you get the idea (:
You can find those coffee mugs with inserts at oriental trading as well for a lot less!
I have a few recipes for treats which I package creatively. Some of my favorites are oven baked caramel corn presented in a clear bag with a special tag, giant frosted sugar cookies given in plain pizza boxes tied with red ribbon and a sprig of evergreen, lemon bread in a clear bag tied with ribbon and small lemons from the craft store, an easy caramel dipped in chocolate and sprinkled with toppings given in candy boxes, simple shortbread packaged in a decorated box, microwave fudge packed in a clear covered candy dish from Walmart, handmade chocolates (more work but worth it), etc. The part I really enjoy is packaging everything creatively. Once I bought shallow bowls on sale and gave them along with pebbles and paperwhite bulbs. A set of blank notecards makes a wonderful gift too. I have packaged those in cellophane bags which I seal with a round gold or silver sticker.
This is what I'm doing for my mom and grandmother in law- Forums at Splitcoaststampers (work in progress) the letters are $2 each at HL. They stand up on their own- but the J seems to not be able to. One in the store did though :(
You can find those coffee mugs with inserts at oriental trading as well for a lot less!
I checked out the OA ones before investing in the starbuck's ones. The problem with the ones at oriental trading is that you have to remove the insert before you wash them. What a pain in the butt if you ask me. The ones at Starbuck's are suppose to be able to left in while being washed. They do have to be handwashed though. I haven't used one yet, so I'm not a 100 percent on it.
You can make your own bath products too and give them in nicely stamped packages - bath bombs (google Bath bombs for a recipe) are particularly easy to make and go over well. Also soups in a jar (great for those who get too many sweets!).
wow, the ideas that everyone has here are amazing !! You will surely be able to come up with some things. I sure hope we get to see them when you get it all finished.
1) Fireside Coffee(Homemade instant coffee mix ) in an altered tin or jar decorated with handmade tags.
Here's the recipe:Cremora Fireside Coffee Recipe
2) Bath salts in jars; very simple. Shake epsom salt and food color in tightly sealed tupperware bowl till covered with dye. Add a few drops of scented oil and shake again. Pour into decorated jars.
__________________ He set His STAMP of ownership on us, and put His spirit in our hearts as a deposit 2 Cor 1:22Jan
Since you mentioned kids...I think family type gifts are fun like maybe a "Smore" basket which could hold all of the items needed for Smores and a cute tag (Wishing you "S'MORE" fun during the holidays).
You could also do one for caramel apples with all the goodies.
I movie basket would be fun with some soda, microwave popcorn, candy and maybe a gift certificate for a video rental.
Just some thoughts that would be inexpensive and cute
Yes they are now I am having a hard time deciding lol. Before I did not have enough ideas, but now I have so many wonderful ideas I cant decide which to pick! Thank you so so much.
If you wanted to just do family gifts you could stamp ornaments. Michael's carries plain white ceramic coasters. You have to use StazOn to stamp on and Sharpies work best for coloring them in. You could write the family's name and the year on it, too.
__________________ Heather Hawkins - Stampin' Up! Demo and new mom. I have the two best jobs ever! stampinheather.blogspot.com
Christmas gift ideas?
