My 12 Homemade Gifts of Christmas...a tad late.

Here are the gifts I made for Christmas 2010 in song form, of course. I know it's January 10th, but sometimes life happens and you finish some of your Christmas crafting projects on January 9th. Right? (I'm looking for some validation here...) :)

On the first day of Christmas I made for a friend: a ruffly cotton garland for a tree*

(*Ok, so it's not for a tree. I'm going for effect, here.)


On the second day of Christmas I very carefully sewed: two stuffed pigs

and a ruffly cotton garland for a tree.


On the third day of Christmas I made all by hand: three pretty tutus,

two stuffed pigs, and a ruffly cotton garland for a tree.


On the fourth day of Christmas I cut out and sewed: four heart-felt bags,

three pretty tutus, two stuffed pigs and a ruffly cotton garland for a tree.


On the fifth day of Christmas I made on my own: five flower headbands,

four heart-felt bags, three pretty tutus, two stuffed pigs and a ruffly cotton garland for a tree.


On the sixth day of Christmas I made lots of these: six shapes of press cookies,

five flower headbands, four heart-felt bags, three pretty tutus, two stuffed pigs and a ruffly cotton garland for a tree.

On the seventh day of Christmas I stayed up to make: seven hundred PB blossoms,

six shapes of press cookies, five flower headbands, four heart-felt bags, three pretty tutus, two stuffed pigs and a ruffly cotton garland for a tree.


On the eighth day of Christmas I didn't sleep to make: eight pounds of peppermint bark,

seven hundred PB blossoms, six shapes of press cookies, five flower headbands, four heart-felt bags, three pretty tutus, two stuffed pigs and a ruffly cotton garland for a tree.


On the ninth day of Christmas I stayed up to late to wrap: nine(ty) lovely presents,

(the gifts that were shipped)

(the gifts that "stayed home")

eight pounds of peppermint bark, seven hundred PB blossoms, six shapes of press cookies, five flower headbands, four heart-felt bags, three pretty tutus, two stuffed pigs and a ruffly cotton garland for a tree.


On the tenth day of Christmas I whipped up late one night: ten homemade marshmallows,

nine(ty) lovely presents, eight pounds of peppermint bark, seven hundred PB blossoms, six shapes of press cookies, five flower headbands, four heart-felt bags, three pretty tutus, two stuffed pigs and a ruffly cotton garland for a tree.


On the eleventh day of Christmas I may have eaten up: eleven vegan sugar cookies,

ten homemade marshmallows, nine(ty) lovely presents, eight pounds of peppermint bark, seven hundred PB blossoms, six shapes of press cookies, five flower headbands, four heart-felt bags, three pretty tutus, two stuffed pigs and a ruffly cotton garland for a tree.


On the twelfth day of Christmas I finally gave away: Twelve pumpkin cupcakes,

eleven vegan sugar cookies, ten homemade marshmallows, nine(ty) lovely presents, eight pounds of peppermint bark, seven hundred PB blossoms, six shapes of press cookies, five flower headbands, four heart-felt bags, three pretty tutus, two stuffed pigs and a ruffly cotton garland for a tree.

I didn't even post about the fudge (which I forgot to photograph), or the two apple pies (complete with star and Christmas tree cutouts)!


I need a nap!

Stay tuned as we get back to our regularly scheduled programming of wedding crafting. :)

Sources:

• Ruffle Garland from Ruffled Blog.
• Stuffed Pigs from Martha Stewart.
• Tutu tutorial on YouTube.
• Heart-Felt Bags from Martha Stewart.
• Braided Headband from this website and flower tutorial from 100 Layer Cake. (Stay tuned for an upcoming guest blog with a tutorial for making these!)
• Almond Press Cookie recipe from Martha Stewart, but I added almond extract as well.
• This is the recipe I use for Peanut Butter Blossoms. It doesn't use shortening or milk. Except I bake at 375 not 275...I assume that's a typo.
• I didn't have a recipe for the peppermint bark. I made that recipe up. :)
• Homemade Marshmallows from here, however I did not coconut-ify them, but don't think I wasn't tempted to do that! Coconut = yumminess!
• Vegan Sugar Cookie recipe found here. (Amazing.)
• The vegan pumpkin cupcakes were a mixture of the Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cupcakes recipe from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, which can be found here (I didn't add the chocolate chips), and the spices from Smitten Kitchen's pumpkin cupcake recipe from here. These qualify as the most amazing vegan thing I've ever baked.

It's my lucky day!!

What a fun and incredibly lucky day! I just learned that I won two giveaways today!

First is a very pretty hairpiece from Flourish by Lillie given away by our fantastic photographer Abbey Hepner.

Check it out here! So pretty with the feathers and the lovely small vintagey broach...plus just a touch of veiling in the center. Mmm... I'm not sure what I'm doing with my hair on my wedding day, but if I don't work the hairpiece into the wedding, then perhaps I'll use it for the engagement photos. I'm not sure, but either way it's so pretty!

Amazingly I also won Amy Atlas' giveaway for the cutest Williams Sonoma gingerbread house bunt pan. How cute is this!?:


I'm ridiculously excited to have my name on Amy Atlas' blog since she's my "job hero" (lawyer turned dessert stylist - I mean really, that's amazing!) and I have a big fat crush on her.

Also, on the job hero front, if I could make a job from wrapping people's gifts for them, I would. Then I'd be my own job hero. (?) I finally have all my Christmas gifts wrapped and ribboned and fancied up. Here are some of the prettier ones:




I'm madly in love with the red and turquoise combination, if you couldn't tell. Also, that little squirrel atop a present all wrapped in woodsy pinecone paper is adorable!


And sometimes when you keep your hot glue gun on the table so it's handy, and you can't figure out how to attach a giant sparkly star, you just glue it right onto the present. :)

I'm certain there are times when I actually spend more on the wrapping than on the gift, but it's how I show my love. :)

I have a tree!

Ok, so it's not *my* tree, but I store my uncle's fake Christmas tree in my basement. We've had some rains in Seattle. Like, a lot of rain. So, I put on some rain boots and waded (is that a word?) around in the 6 inches of water in my basement to save what I could. Not that there's much to save - most everything's up on blocks down there because it floods every year, but not to this degree. Long story short, the fake Christmas tree had to come upstairs. My uncle got a real tree this year = I get to have a tree my last year as a bachelorette (or something.) So here's my "bachelorette tree."


As you can see in the following very helpfully labeled photo (taken without flash so you can see the pretty glowy), the cat approves: