Look What I Got!

Look at all the goodies I got in my stocking from Donna!

~Several packs of rubber gloves- for soapmaking b/c I am always losing them.
~Orange Cream soda from Whole Foods- my absolute favorite soft drink ever!
~Adorable little bottle of Diet Coke- so needed this one today too.
~3 Fat Quarters of Fabric- love the snowmen on the Christmas scene one.

She made the stocking from a sweater at Goodwill. I love the buttons on the heel!

A very cute needle book. I have needed one of these for so long but never thought to make on for myself. I do a lot of hand stitching while waiting in the pickup line at school to get the girls in the afternoons and am always searching for my needle. Hmm, should have taken a close-up of the front. It is green with my name and a flower hand embroidered on the front and a little felt flower in one corner.

Reusable snack bag filled with peanut M&M's. Is this an ongoing gift? Can I give it back to you when it is empty and you refill it for me?

My gloves were wrapped up in the black piece of fabric and tied up with a pretty teal ribbon. I will have to confiscate it from a cheetos eating 4 year old later.

THANK YOU DONNA!

Christmas Stocking Exchange

I did a Christmas Stocking Exchange with Donna at Mudpies and Memories.
Here are the rules we went by:
1. The stocking must be homemade and from items already in our sewing/crafting stashes.
2. No more than $5 can be spent
3. At least one item must be purchased from Goodwill (a frugalista favorite)
4. Must include at least 1 candy/food item (because we love to eat!)

Here are the things I put in Donna's gift:

Homemade Apple Muffin Mix

Seriously, how cute is this smiling spoon. I recieved a set of 6 for Christmas and just had to share one.

Banana Chips

Scrabble Tile Necklace and kit so she can make more. The tiles are from a game I found at Goodwill.

Bottlecap Pincushion. I actually went "dumpster diving" in our big garbage can outside to reclaim the apple juice lid for this one!

Scarf- knitted this one myself! I'm so proud I finished it in 24 hours during my hubby's Sunday and Monday football watching sessions.

1/2 yard of Coca Cola fabric from my stash used to wrap the gift. I was just NOT in the mood to make a stocking and this way it can be reused for something else.

Here it is all wrapped up and ready to give.

Scrabble Tile Necklace

Aleene's Paper Glaze 2 oz $5.99 (Michael's)

Triple Thick 4 oz jar $3.99 (Hobby Lobby)

Scrabble Tiles (from a $1 Goodwill game)

Mod Podge

Fabric or Paper design of choice

Eye Hooks

I much prefer the Triple Thick over the Paper Glaze. The Triple Thick will have more tiny bubbles left after it dries, but for making these for myself or as gifts, I am ok with that. If I were going to make them to sell, I would probably want to go with epoxy, but it's just not worth the hassle for me when I am only making 3-4 at the time. The Triple Thick will get much harder than the Paper Glaze even with a week or more drying time. I like the initial overall look of the Paper Glaze but like the durability of Triple Thick much better.

I found these eye hooks at Hobby Lobby in the clockmaking section. Odd place if you ask me, but that's the only place I saw them. I found them by accident actually. I think there were 30 in a pack for about $1.99.

For Donna's I chose to use fabric, and on Aly's I used an image that I found online and printed out on my inkjet printer which everywhere I read said not to do because the colors would run.

From Left to Right: Donna, Aly, Abby

1) Paint a thin coat of Mod Podge on your Scrabble tile and stick your image to that.

2) Trim paper or fabric so it is even with the edges of your tile.

3) If you used paper, apply a thin coat of Mod Podge to the top of it and let it dry completely. This will help the colors not run.

4) Apply a coat of Triple Thick using a paintbrush. Let this dry for 3 days. The jar says 24 hours, but mine was not completely hard so I waited extra time.

5) Drill a small starter hole for your eye hook. On my first one, I drilled the hole too far. The smallest drill bit I had is slightly larger than the diameter of the eye hook so it wouldn't stay in. What worked best for me was to drill into the tile only a tiny bit, then hold the eye hook with my jewelry pliers in my left hand, tile in my right hand and screw the tile onto the hook instead of the hook into the tile if that makes sense.

You can find the ball chains sold individually or in packs of 5 at Hobby Lobby. They are pretty cheap to begin with and I happened to find them when they had jewelry supplies on sale for 50% off. I think the single one as around $1.47 regular price. I also picked up some lobster claw clasps and cord ends so I could make necklaces from thin ribbon or cord.

I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas

I just had to let everyone know how much I absolutely LOVE the new song on my blog playlist. I heard it for the first time a couple of years ago. It is rarely played these days but it makes me so happy every time I hear it.

Here is some info on it from Wiki:

Peevey was a regional child star of the Oklahoma City area. When released nationally by Columbia Records, the song shot to the top of the charts and the city zoo acquired a baby hippo named Matilda. A popular legend holds that this 1953 hit had been recorded as a fund-raiser to bring the city zoo a hippo; but in a 2007 radio interview with Detroit-based WNIC radio station, Peevey clarified that the song was not originally recorded as a fundraiser. Instead, a local promoter picked up on the popularity of the song and Peevey's local roots, and launched a campaign to present her with an actual hippopotamus on Christmas. The campaign succeeded, and she was presented with an actual hippopotamus, which she donated to the city zoo. The hippopotamus lived for nearly 50 years. Gayla Peevey later recorded as Jamie Horton, scoring the Billboard Hot 100 charter "My Little Marine" in 1960.

Pajamas for the Girls

For the most part, my Mama has always made the girls pajamas for me, or they had ones that their Mimi (hubby's mom) bought for them. This year, Hancock fabrics had their flannel fabric on sale for $1.99/ yard on Black Friday, and patterns were $1 so I decided to make some for the girls myself. I wanted Christmas fabric, but it wasn't included in the sale, so I went with these instead. I would have bought some Christmas PJs but with Abby's eczema, we have been trying to dress her in all cotton since it doesn't irritate her skin like polyester can sometimes. And, all cute PJs I have found in stores were polyester.

Aly loves hot chocolate especially with marshmallows and that's wintery enough for me. Abby loves Owls, but there wasn't any of that so I got her green with birds and we are going to call it 4 Calling Birds to make it Christmasey. We will probably let them open these on Christmas Eve.

Aly's Hot Chocolate with Marshmallows


Abby's 4 Calling Birds


I used Simplicity pattern #2771. I liked the fact that it didn't have a traditional collar but more of a baseball jersey type neck/ closure.