I don't know about you, but I LOVE making homemade gifts... especially Christmas gifts. Last year, my younger sister asked for some Christmas decorations so she and her new husband can decorate their new abode. Instead of spending a ton of money on very little, I cranked some ideas out of Le Studio, and made an awesome gift basket full of homemade Christmas decorations.
I started with a big, green bucket that I had laying around. Barely used. Made it all nice and shiny, and slapped a sparkly, red bow on the front.
I went to the dollar store and picked up a couple of frames, for the printables I had either found online or made myself. One was a cute saying with some Christmas clip art, the other a Santa Key poem I found somewhere online. Other items from the dollar store included fillers such as a bell, cookie cutters and some window clings.
For the DIY pieces:
- Apple Pie Moonshine
- I used a mason jar with a pretty ribbon wrapped around it, and a cute sticker that says "Homemade with <3"
- A Cookie-in-a-Jar Recipe
- Hand painted Christmas bulbs
- I painted adorable penguins with pink and blue scarves on the outside of them.
- I used white glitter inside the bulb as snow, and tied a blue and pink ribbon on each.
- Sock Snowmen
- These were so fun to make! I used some new, clean socks, rice, and some spare buttons I had laying around. I even made some for myself!
- Wedding Invitation Bulb
- I made their wedding invitations, so I had an extra printed. I cut the invite into small strips, curled them and placed them inside the bulb.
- I added a small silver heart charm and some gold ribbon to the top of the bulb.
- Snowman refrigerator magnet set
- By using Microsoft Word, some clip art and some light magnets, I created a big snowman for the front door or refrigerator.
- I printed a large picture of each piece: coal eyes, mouth, carrot nose, a wooden pipe, a two piece scarf, big coal buttons, and a three piece top hat with mistletoe.
- I cut out all of the printed pieces and laminated them so they'd last.
- I used some crazy glue and light magnets from Michael's.
- For the presentation, I used a large white envelope and printed a border and picture of the snowman altogether on the front.
- Here's a DIY link if you want to use construction paper instead of the printer.
Everything was so much fun to make!
To make sure everything looked nice in the basket, I used some small foam blocks on the bottom, to boost everything up a bit. I used all kinds of tissue paper between the foam and the gifts.
She really loved her homemade decorations. :)
I did have pictures of everything while I was making them, and finished products of each. So sad that I lost almost all of my pictures when I was switching between an old and a new laptop. Good thing I sent this picture to my mom when I was done! It would have been lost for good like the others!
