Hand Making Holiday Gifts Part One

I promised to show you some ideas for handmade gifts, and I'm going to use for examples things I'v actually made as gifts. Upfront disclaimer: I try to make most of my gifts every holiday season, and I regularly thrift gifts, too. It's a way to avoid spending too much during the holidays, which is always a good thing.

With the first idea the packaging is actually the gift I made. Someone will be opening this Christmas is this pair of Ray Ban sunglasses from a Thred Up fun box with a quilted case I sewed for them. I found the free pattern for the case online here, and it only took an hour. I had on hand all the materials, too, so it cost nothing but my time. You can find an inexpensive fun pair of sunglasses for less than $5 at Wal-Mart, or even cheaper at Dollar Tree.

This linen junk journal I made back in September was a 100% recycled project, as it has a cover made from an old stitch practice piece, a vintage kitchen towel for the lining that I had on hand, and pages I made from pretty papers and cardstock I've saved over the years. It was a gift to myself, but you can make one of these for a family member or friend who likes to journal. Here's a really good blog post from House of Mahalo on how to make many different kinds.

If you're good with words but not particularly crafty, why not set up a blind date with a book as a gift? Here's the one I bought myself from Writer's Block, an independent book store in Winter Garden. It came wrapped in brown paper with a postcard describing the premise, which didn't sound like anything I'd ever read, so I thought, why not? I actually enjoyed my blind date so much I bought another novel by the author. If your recipient isn't a huge reader, try a blind date with a music CD, a movie DVD, or a cookbook.

Stay tuned to the blog for Part Two, when I'll tell you about some of the food gifts I give every year.

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Other Stashes

Along with clearing out the spare bedroom and tidying my office and our guest bedroom, I decided to reorganize some of my stashes. This is all the yarn I have on hand, sorted by color. It looks like a lot, but lately I've been using up a minimum of half a bin every month, so this is approximately a year's supply. All of my solid color cotton perle thread. I go through a lot of this every year, too. I need a container in which I can fit all of it together, but I haven't found the right one yet. I won't show you all of my fabric -- I'm still reorganizing this stash -- but I went through everything and donated two bins of fabric I won't need to the local quilter's guild.

Downsizing

This was my fabric stash once I sorted everything -- 22 full bins. I spent a day taking out and boxing up what I could part with, with the goal of trying to reduce it by half, so I'd have 11 bins. I was very strict with myself, and removed everything that for one reason or another I was sure I wouldn't be able to use. This is what I ended up with -- 12 bins of fabric that I'm keeping. It's not quite half, but close enough. Half of what I took out went to a local quilter friend, a school and Goodwill. These four tightly-packed bins will be going to the local quilting guild once I make arrangements with them for a drop-off place. I am relieved and a little sad and now determined to control my impulses to thrift more fabric. I don't want to do this again, so until I use up six bins, I can't for any reason bring any new fabric into the house.

In Progress

I promised myself I would show you the good, bad and ugly of my cleaning this year. This is what it looks like when you dump thirty years' worth of stashed fabric on the floor -- and oy, what a pain in the butt to pick up again! This is what it looks like after it's been sorted, folded and placed in containers, which took me about a week. Now the hard part is to downsize my stash by at least half, I think (that's my goal, anyway.) I've already e-mailed the president of the local quilting guild, a local friend who is a quilter, and a public school art teacher I know to see if I can donate some of the excess to them. The rest will go to Goodwill. Already I've reduced my vintage textiles from two bins to one, and my scraps from three bins to one. It's probably the hardest clean-out I've done, which is why I saved it until last. I know I have too much fabric, more than I can use in my lifetime -- but at the same time, I love it. So I have to...

Valerean

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