----- Original Message ----- From: "Spring" ~*~ Ideas for Gift Wrapping Simply Perfect: Colored handmade paper can be machine or handgun (use bright threads) into pouches to fit any size gift. Close with ribbons, bows, or raffia. Complete with candy cane, pine cones or another small token. Pretty Natural: Glue a random pattern of dried leaves to textured or plain brown paper. Tie with braided raffia. On top: loose strands of raffia tied in a bow. Finish with an exotic dried fruit or faux berries. Shimmering Stars: cover with dark purple paper with glassine and wrap your box. Tie a lush satin ribbon in a bow, then slide through silver rickrack. Mount a metallic star on wire and attach it to the ribbon. Classic Elegance: Wrap a store-bought white-and-gold paper and glossy gold cord, then all pleated paper instead of bows: Fold rectangles of paper accordion style, open into fan shapes, then glue onto wrapped gift. Also crimp thin strips of paper and tack on as streamers. Small glass balls on wire steams twined around the cord provide the final flourish. Magic and Mystery: Gather a large rectangle of stiff fabric around the box. Tie with a contrasting silk ribbon. Just for fun, tuck two feathers under the ribbon. A Touch of Glamour: Try an unusual combo: Wrap the gift box with red foil paper and a wide orange taffeta ribbon. Add swirls of chiffon ribbon and, on top, a red rose bow. For a dramatic contrast, glue on a dried leaf. ~~*~~*~~*~~ ~*~ Recipe for Snow You get ivory now and whip it in your mixer with a little water in it to make snow. I did a massive amount and had so much fun doing it. I wondered if I was going to have soap bubles if it rained. Well I was suprised to find out that it kinda turns to rubber after the sun and elements hit it. In fact I had to use a putty knife to take it off of what I had put it on :-) Then I was able to wash the residue off :-) I decided the next time I would use a cardboard backing so I could just lift it off the objects. After I whipped the snow I "iced" (with the snow) what I wanted to have it. Your imagnation can have a ball with it. The only thing I wish I had done differently is put some sparkle in it so it would look like real snow in the sunlight. ~~*~~*~~*~~ ~*~ Christmas Basket Instructions Here is a neat Christmas Basket idea: Recipe Basket: Hand-write you favorite dessert recipe on a note card. Collect all the non-perishable ingredients to your recipe and place them in a basket. Add the already made dessert wrapped and tied with a bow. For extras put a wooden spoon or timer in with the ingredients. They can taste the dessert then have the recipe and dessert to make it. ~*~ I saw a picture in a craft book yesterday of a painted candle that was really cute. It was a white candle and it had the Christmas light bulbs painted around it. They were connected with a black line so they looked like a string of Christmas lights in lots of pretty colors. I bet it would look good when it began to burn down and the light shows through the various bulb colors. ~*~ I make my own angel candles. I take craft paint and either paint the whole candle gold or just highlight the hair and wings in gold. I do not do anything to the candle before or after painting and they stay nice forever. ~*~ I learned how to do this a few years ago and it has really come in handy when I need a small gift box and I don't have one. Separate the front from the back from an old greeting card. Take a ruler and put it from one corner to the other (diagonally) and using a pencil lightly draw a line (you will be making an X when finished). Repeat for the other corner. Do this for both pieces. Take the front of the card and fold almost up to the point where the lines cross (do this to make 4 folds). Now cut on the long ends up to the fold (making 4 cuts). you should have four tabs when finished. On one end fold the tabs in and tape then fold in remaining flap over tabs and tape in place (you can use glue but tape is quicker). Repeat with back of card except when folding bring up to where the lines meet ( since it will be the bottom of the box it needs to be a little smaller). After cutting you can erase lines. ~*~ Kissing Ball Steal a kiss from your Santa beneath the mistletoe. This kissing ball is made on a base of a potato, and will last for a surprisingly long time. Materials: large potato 18" strong but flexible wire florist's picks with wires cedar 1 1/2 yards ribbon mistletoe Choose a firm, large potato. Push a strong but flexible wire from top to bottom and back to top of potato. Twist the ends of the wire into a loop. Gather sprigs of cedar into a cluster, and wire together with a florist's pick. Push the picks into the potato to form a full ball, covering the potato completely. Trim sprigs that are uneven, so the ball shape is maintained. Add a long loop of ribbon for hanging. Make a bow from the ribbon and attach with a florist's pick. Finish the design with a sprig of mistletoe wired to a florist's pick and pushed into place. ~*~ Wood Light Bulb Garland Materials: 8 1-5/8" high wood eggs (50 cents each) 8 1" high wood spools (16 cents each) paints: hunter green or brown, christmas green, christmas red, copenhagen (bright) blue, bright yellow ($1.50 each) 2 meter or yards 2 ply jute gloss or satin water based varnish flat brush glue Directions: 1. Paint all the spools hunter green (or brown as desired). Paint two eggs red, two bright green, two blue and the last two yellow. 2. Glue the fat end of each egg to the top of each spool. 3. Varnish all of these new light bulbs. Let dry. 4. Starting about 6" in from each end of the jute string, evenly space the light bulbs along the string. Lay this out on the table to get the right spacing. To fasten bulbs to string, pinch a bit of the string and glue the fold into the open end of the spool. 5. Hang up anywhere you can't normally plug in a string of lights. Most people don't know its wood until you point it out. You could also do these in red & pink for valentine's day, or pastels for Easter, or colors of whatever holiday is coming up!. ~*~ Candy Wreath Materials needed: green covered wire coat hanger (like those colored ones with plastic coating on them) assorted hard candies with cellophane wrappers (that you twist to open) needle and thread Simply take the coat hanger and bend and work the hanger part until it is in a fairly round shape. Leave the 'hook' part alone...this is what you'll be hanging it by. With your needle and thread, sew one end of a candy wrapper to the round part of the hanger...keep adding candies and going around the hanger till you have a single layer of candies. Push them back a bit, and add another layer. Keep sewing candies on the hanger until you have many layers sewn around the hanger and you can't see the green part of the hanger. To remove a candy, just cut off the end of the wrapper and slip the candy from the open end. ~*~ Stick Tree Materials: 8" long stick with no branches 5" x 8" piece of stiff Christmas print or plaid fabric Pinking shears Instructions: 1.Using the pinking shears, cut five pieces from the fabric: 7" x 3/4"; 6" x 3/4"; 5" x 3/4"; 4" x 3/4" and 3" x 3/4" 2.Tie the 3" piece of fabric around the stick near to the top. Make sure that the free ends are roughly equal in length. 3.Tie the 4" piece of fabric around the stick about 1 1/2" below the first piece. Continue tying the pieces to the stick, 1 1/2" apart, from smallest to largest. Make sure that the knots you tie are all on the same side of the stick. 4.Pull the ends of the fabric straight out from the stick so that they form "branches". If your fabric is not stiff enough, the "branches" will sag. 5.You can glue a piece of gold cord to the top of the tree to hang it or plant the stick into your favorite plant pot to dress it up for Christmas. Take thin brown cardboard and cut gingerbread men or teddy bear shapes out. Get together scraps of ribbon, lace, felt, buttons, yarn or cloth. You can use virtually anything to decorate these. White craft of school glue works well to apply the scraps. Cut out shapes such as shirts, pants or skirts and decorate to your liking! Kids love creating their own little outfits for the bears. ~*~ I saw the sleds at a store and thought I could make that. So, since I don't have written instructions I will do my best. Popsicle Sleds: 1. Glue 5 sticks together to form the sled frame. The top of the sticks should form a shape like this ^. 2. Cut a piece of cardboard or trim a stick to form the handles. You will need to round one or both sides of this piece. You glue this across the top of the frame. 3. Wait until this dries and then glue to sticks to the bottom for runners. 4. Let it dry and paint. You can add yarn or cord for a hanger. Also you can paint names across the handle part. Hope that helps. ~*~ Clay Pot Christmas Tree Have you seen the stacked flower pots painted to look like a Christmas tree? You paint the pots (3-6 graduated sizes) green, then sponge paint the rims with white, turn them upside down and glue together. Then, rip gingham into strips, tie into bow and hot glue on for decorations or I guess you could decorate it with whatever; this particular idea was in last years Woman's Day. I've also seen 3 pots done much the same way, only painted white and decorated to look like snowmen. ~*~ Holiday Flower Pot Candles Spray paint 2 1/2 inch flower pots dark green. Use a small sea sponge w/lots of texture to lightly sponge gold paint on rims. Then sponge silver paint on the bottom of the pot. The green should show through, the sponging just gives interesting texture. (Substitute other colors if you like.) Tie two ribbons around the rim of the pot to match the colors sponged on. Attach jingle bells or other small ornaments as desired before curling the ribbon. Put a votive candle in the pot. ~*~ HERSHEY KISSES TREE Using a 12" styrofoam cone (green if possible) as the tree, I push in the cap from a shaving cream can into the bottom to make a base for the tree. I buy Hershey Kisses in the Christmas colored wrappers. I use almost all green, about 15 reds and one silver. I use the round toothpicks (the flat ones break too easily) and cut them in half. I insert one end of the toothpick in the green kiss and starting at the bottom of the cone, insert the other end of the toothpick in the cone. I work my way around the base until I get back to the first kiss. Then I move up a row and keep working my way all the way around the cone until I am at the top. They won't fit side by side exactly, which is why I like to use a green cone...the empty spaces don't show as much as when you use a white cone. Every once in a while I throw in a red kiss, which are supposed to be the ornaments and one silver one for the very top of the cone which is the star. The little tags look like tinsel. Hints: 1) Don't use kisses with almonds. It is almost impossible to get the toothpick in through the nuts. 2) Try and find the kisses in a bulk candy store. This way, when the sales person isn't looking you can pick out all the green ones. Saves you money so you don't have to buy bags and bags of kisses just to get the green ones. 3) Send a small container of extra kisses wherever the tree is going. My dh's co-workers can demolish a tree in one or two days, and since he likes it to last a little longer then that he puts out a small bowl of loose kisses for them to eat first. 4) When cutting the round toothpicks, they have a tendency to fly all over the place. Protect your eyes. 5) Wouldn't recommend this for kids.....I would worry they would eat the candy without taking out the toothpick. 6) Works with any size cone. They make 8" and 6" cones too. 7) Someone asked if you could do this with a round styrofoam ball, but I don't think it would work. The kisses have a tendency to fall out of the cone easily. Especially if you've used the same cone two years in a row. (the holes get big). I would imagine as soon as you hung the ball the kisses in the bottom would fall out. My dh takes his tree to work in a plastic bag. This way if any of the kisses fall out on the way, he doesn't lose them. 8) If you're going to eat the kisses while making the tree, make sure you put enough reds and one silver one aside so you don't run out! ~*~ You could photocopy sheet music (reduce it if necessary) onto cardstock and cut it out in the shape of something Christmassy (we did Hark the Herald Angels Sing-angel; Jingle Bells-bell; 12 Days of Christmas-partridge; etc. using cookie cutters for patterns). Again punch a hole in it; cover with thinned glue and sprinkle with the iridescent glitter. We did this to both sides of the cardstock. Then add a ribbon and any other decoration you might like. I try to do quick, easy, fairly unbreakable things myself with my kids because we live thousands of miles from our family. ~*~ I've made the Santa Can and filled it with Caramel Popcorn. Caramel Popcorn 6 quart popcorn in roaster (popped) Boil 5 minutes: 2 cups brown sugar 1 cup butter 1/2 cup white corn syrup Add: 1 teaspoon vanilla 1 teaspoon baking soda 1 teaspoon salt Pour over popcorn and mix. Bake 250' for 40 minutes. Stir every 10 minutes. May add nuts to popcorn before baking. ~*~ Unique Gift Idea- Cookies in a Dustpan! Purchase new dust pans from the dollar store Bake cookies, or bar cookies Arrange the cookies on the dust pan and wrap with pretty colored cellophane. Tie with a bow, and add a tag with this poem: "I was baking some cookies When they dropped on the floor, so I scooped them right up And rushed them to your door!" ~*~ Christmas Tea Bag and Poem I saw this this weekend at a craft shop. There was a little bag made of Christmas fabric, just big enough to fit a tea bag in. It was wrapped with a pretty ribbon and this poem was attached: On Christmas Day at half past three, Brew yourself a cup of tea. I'll think of you, You think of me While sitting 'round the Christmas Tree. Really cute idea,isn't it. Should be a good seller at a craft fair.