Gift wrapping with a TShirt

Don't know what to do with those free tshirts you get a career fairs or other promotional events?

How about using them to wrap your next Christmas/Birthday present.  Recycle, Reuse, and Reduce.  YAY

Christmas Holiday Fascinators

Last month I showed my Thanksgiving Fascinators.  This month, it's Christmas time!  Tis the season to celebrate Jesus's birth, and to decorate with flashy lights and sing Carols.  

I gather a bunch of different Christmas themed items and grouped by similar colours.  Than playfully arranged them and stuck them on a headband this time instead of a hair barrette.  

Many of these headbands can be found on my Etsy shop

http://www.etsy.com/shop/ThreeLace

My favorite parts of these pieces are the christmas light ornaments because they are such icon to the holiday for me.

Christmas Tree Geekery

My Christmas tree is up!

Over the years I have collected a lot of Star Wars ornaments (mostly from Hallmark) that I received as gifts. When shopping for Christmas gifts for a nerd it's hard to go wrong with Star Wars ornaments!

I also have a lot of Disney ornaments. When I was a kid my sister and I had a mini Christmas tree that we filled with only Disney ornaments so I have a whole shoebox full of them. My hubby likes to go to Disneyland a lot so I try to get a different ornament for each trip.

I love my Arena Battle Padme ornament because that was my first Star Wars costume I made!

The Looney Tunes ornament actually has working gears with a handle you turn to raise and lower Wile E. Coyote. Cool!

Captain Kirk is my only Star Trek ornament but he looks awesome commanding from his chair near the top of the tree.

And that  little fox is just cute, isn't it?

Xbox Christmas Wreath

Oh what a geeky way to decorate the holiday!  A Christmas Wreath to hang on your door.  I think I'm going to bring it to work and hang it outside my office.

So I happened to have a excess stack of unopened Xbox games.

So I thought, what can I do with it?  

Hey Christmas is coming up.  Arrange in a circle and glue them together

Add some Green ribbon to hang with

Since I have so many discs, let me share with the world.   You can find these wreaths on my ThreeLace Etsy shop http://www.etsy.com/shop/threelace

Party Hats

My aunt had a great idea for something to do on New Year's Eve while we were waiting for the clock to strike midnight. She brought out scissors, glue, cardboard and leftover Christmas wrapping paper, and we all went to town making...

PARTY HATS!

OK yeah I went a little overboard and ended up making a boater hat and a mini top hat.

My sister modeled my hat for me. She is actually a professional actress, model and photographer in NY.

Tiny top hat!

Chewbacca approves.

Christmas Tree Angel

I decided to make a new topper for our new 9-foot Christmas tree! I wanted to make either an angel or a star, and since a star needs to light up and that's really complicated I decided to make an angel out of random stuff in my craft room.

First I took a long strand of raffia string (I decided this looks like rustic angel hair) and folded it back and forth, then stuffed it through a large wooden bead (which sort of looks like an angel's head, if you have an imagination like mine). Then I twisted a piece of gold rope against itself (this is the crown or halo), cut it and hot-glued it on top and trimmed the raffia to look like hair.

For the body I made a cone out of white craft form. For wings I used a pretty piece of ribbon which I threaded through a hole in the back. I then bordered the hole with pieces of the same gold I used for the halo-crown to hide the ugly hole.

Next I got out a bunch of coordinating white and gold trim and lace and decided to figure out how to decorate the body to make a dress. I made a bit of a mess.

I started glueing pieces of lace over the white foam, starting with the bottom piece so the upper pieces would overlap like layers of a skirt. A strand of white "pearls" became a necklace for the angel.

Here is the finished angel, as an ornament. I need a ladder to get her up on top of my tree!

18th Annual Gingerbread Village Report

For many years the Gingerbread Village is on display at the Sheraton Hotel in Downtown Seattle.  It sits in the lobby while hundreds of people an hour walk past admiring their work.  Although it's free any donations collected go to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation

Swiss Family Robbinson come to mind?

Looks like a toy story theme

Elves loading up Santa's Sleigh

After this my boyfriend started pondering questions like, "are they safe to eat after sitting out so long?"  and "how long do these things last?"

Glowing Xbox Christmas Bells

So as you might have learned, both me and Ava work in the Tech industry.  I happen to work at Xbox . . . now you can take a moment and go "whoah" ka ka ka.  Sorry I'm being prideful.  Back to the story.  For our 'Holiday' party our invite came with a picture of bells that glowed the Xbox logo. COOL

Thus we start with some Bells purchased at our local dollar store.





Shove some green glow sticks inside
and turn off the lights. 



ka ka ka, loop them through a hair tie and Vola, instant hair accessory.

Our 'Holiday' party was at two downtown clubs that they rented out.  Walk around in a crowded dark room was a great way to show these off.

Don't they look awesome?

-SmallRiniLady

Materials:  Bells, GlowSticks, Hair Ties

Chocolate-Dipped Cookies

We have so many relatives that we see over the holidays it is just not reasonable to buy gifts for everyone! But it isn't too hard to mass-produce yummy treats! You could just buy some and wrap them in cute bags, but when you make them yourself and wrap them yourself it is a nicer touch that anyone will appreciate.

Every Christmas my mom makes chocolate-covered pretzels as gifts, so I made chocolate-dipped Oreos and graham crackers! And then added sprinkles.



Some turned out kind of ugly, but they were still TASTY!

If I did it again, I would just stick with Oreos; perhaps an assortment of Vanilla and Mint.



I found cute reindeer bags and added a tag, jinglebell and ribbon. To make the tags I just cut out the shapes from cardstock paper, punched a hole in the end for the ribbon, stuck a Christmas sticker on one side and addressed the other.

Make Your Own Christmas Decorations

'Tis the season for crafting decorations!

I decorated two Christmas wreaths for my home. This is a very simple craft project that you can easily customize to any decor style.

If you're hanging the wreath on a door, bells add a nice touch because they'll jingle whenever the door opens or closes.

Or you can just literally hang a bell on your door. That works too.

Sparkly silk flowers make a nice arrangement on the dining table. I added a coordinating purple bow.

While you're in the floral section, pick up some sprigs and flowers to accent a wreath too!

All you need is:
1 plain wreath
1 small roll of fancy wired ribbon
5 or more flourishes of holly or flowers
1 wreath hanger
Ornaments or bells

Step 1: get a plain wreath and fluff out all of the branches to make it look fuller. Bonus Points: wrap a strand of battery-operated holiday lights around the wreath and secure the battery pack to the back of the wreath.
Step 2: Wrap the ribbon around the wreath, being careful not to twist the ribbon as you do so. You will probably use the whole roll, so make sure the ends are even in length, then tie a pretty bow at the bottom (or at the top if you prefer).
Step 3: Add "garnishes" - sprigs of holly or silk flowers, ornaments, bells.
Step 4: Hang it on a door and enjoy!

Green Christmas Tree

This tree is made from paper that I grabbed from the recycling bin.

1) Make a lot of cones (out of paper) with a similar size
2) Create one large Cone (out of paper) to use as the trunk of the tree
3) Begin attaching (via glue, tape, or staples) the cones to the trunk working your way up. Use the larger cones for the bottom and the smaller cones at the top
4) use any additional paper to make decorations such as stars, hanging balls, or streamers.

-Rini
Material: Paper, tape (because that was what i had on hand)