College Survival Kit

For Kenedy's open house I wanted to give her a gift instead of just handing her money, but obviously it needed to be something as useful and necessary as money haha...I have made these before for my nieces going off to college so decided to make one for Kenedy too. It's a very easy gift to put together and the kids seem to really like it - I found this double-sided case at Hobby Lobby but usually I use one of the clear plastic holders like the kind that were originally meant for organizing embroidery thread and has customizable dividers. Then hit up the dollar store, grocery store, drug store, or even look around your house for (unused!) things that a college kid might need (and not even know they are going to need!).

Here's what I included - make it personal and tailor the kit for your recipient:

• gift cards for ('emergency') fast food - pizza, subs, Taco Bell, Starbucks
• cotton balls and q-tips
• small sewing kit with pre-threaded needles in basic colors, couple buttons, safety pins
• tiny stapler, paper clips, rubber bands, sticky notes, tape, krazy glue, a sharpie pen
• phone cord
• tylenol, airborne, throat lozenges, rolaids, neosporin, bandaids, chapstick
• lysol, tide stick
• hair ties, nail clippers, tweezers, nail file
• tiny toothpaste, mouthwash, floss sticks
• batteries, matches and a tea light
• gum, package of fruit snacks, package of almonds

There might be more things in there but now I can't remember ;). Just wing it - it's fun to put together!

I found the "college survival kit" printable here and taped one on each side. Just 'cuz it's cute.

I wrapped it in tissue paper and made one of my favorite tissue flower bows for the top (click here to see how to make them!)

String Art Heart and Scottie

I love making string art! This is pretty simple, hard to mess up, quick, fairly inexpensive, and a different pretty gift - what's not to love?

Here are two projects that I've done - a Scottie (I made for myself just 'cuz) and a heart for my sister who got married yesterday! On hers I stamped the date, it looked good before I added that but I wanted to make it more personalized.

Supplies:
-piece of wood: for the Scottie I bought an unfinished wood plaque from the craft store and painted it using craft paint; for the heart I bought this wood pallet board with attached hanger at the craft store.
-embroidery floss: for the Scottie I used solid black, for the heart I used 3 different colors (light gray, blush, metallic dark gray)
-small nails: scottie is gold, heart is copper
-hammer
-paper template of the shape you want to make: I found a free Scottie outline on line and adjusted the print size until I got the size I wanted, for the heart I just freehanded a 6" heart and cut it out.
-ruler if you want to measure the spacing between the nails, they don't have to be exact if you want to just eyeball it.

Directions:
-lay out the template where you want it to go on the board. make dots on the paper where you are going to put the nails. for the scottie I didn't measure as carefully, just tried to follow the shape putting the nails where they would create the best outline. for the heart I did about 1/2" spaces between the nails.  how close or far apart you put them will depend on the size and simplicity of your pattern.
-lightly tap in the nails around the outermost edges of the paper shape, try to keep them at a level depth.
-after all the nails are in gently remove the paper. if any of the paper gets stuck around the nails just carefully pick it out with a sharp object.
-tie one end of the string around a nail then just go back and forth, up and down, winding the string around different nails to create whatever pattern (or I should say non-pattern) that you want. If you don't like how it's looking just undo the string and start again! To get a nice finished outline I wound the floss around every nail in a row around the outside edge. You'll want to pull the string taut but not so tight that the nails move, and be careful about letting go before tying off because it unravels easily!
-when you are done stringing the floss between the nails tie off the end on a nail and trim the excess.
-I left a tail on the heart because I liked how it looked! For the Scottie I trimmed the end off close to the final nail.

cut out whatever shape you are making, mark dots where the nails will go

nail all around the edge of the shape to create the outline, then remove the paper

wind the string back and forth around the nails, go in all directions to create an almost cobweb look

this is with one layer in light gray. next I did a layer of blush and then finished with a layer of metallic dark gray. 

                   

Peppermint Sugar Scrub

Made this quick sugar scrub for some girlfriend gifts - literally took me 5 minutes. Actually it took me longer to tie the twine on the jar and get it to stay than it did to make the scrub! Smells great, and is totally edible if you get hungry while showering LOL.

Mix together 1 cup white sugar with 1/4 cup coconut oil (coconut oil is solid at room temperature, just micro it for a few seconds and it will liquify), 1 teaspoon peppermint extract and a drop of green food coloring. Use more of the peppermint and color if you want either stronger - I was going for pale green and just a hint of peppermint. Stir until all of the ingredients are incorporated - if it seems a little dry just add a bit more oil until you get the consistency you want - then spoon into a pretty jar. I tied on a label with a length of bakers twine to finish.

Notebook Paper Frame

I love back to school time of year - I think that's one of those either love it or hate it things. Dave hates it, how many years later he is still traumatized about going to school hahaha, but it makes me excited! I was shopping with Brooke the other day looking at school supplies (see here for her jazzing up her composition notebooks) and I couldn't resist getting myself notebooks, folders and new markers! Pitiful I know...but I love this stuff. So when I saw this idea I immediately knew I'd be making it.

I saw this frame idea on the Michaels website, I didn't follow their instructions exactly but that's what an inspiration idea is for! See an idea, change it if you want to, and make it your own...

This is super simple - paint a plain wood frame white; after it dries make lines using a blue fine point sharpie every 3/8" inch horizontally on the frame. Then make 2 vertical red lines on the left side - looks like notebook paper! So cute, what a great teacher gift (or a gift for someone like me who is slightly obsessed with notebook paper)!

I wasn't patient enough to paint one side and
let it dry before painting the flip side!

To make the picture to put in the frame, I played around with some free circle flower templates I found online (click here for the site I used) and added the 'make my day camp' text.

Bath Salts

I have a big jar of Epsom salts next to my bath tub, I've been buying them already scented but I decided this time to make make my own - I'm asking myself why haven't I been doing this all along? There are lots of "recipes" online but I didn't want to do anything fancy, just plain old scented salts - so I put about 6 cups of salt in a big glass bowl and added 30 drops each of eucalyptus and lavender essential oils, mixed it all up and then realized that the eucalyptus wayyyyy overpowers the lavender so I added more lavender until it smelled like both scents. Just like my cooking, I just added more until it was what I wanted :). So easy!

Tip: I keep a small plastic scoop in the jar and add a few scoops to the running bath water. I made the mistake of keeping a pretty wood scoop in there before but the salt destroyed it! Lesson learned - I recommend using plastic.

If I make this as a gift in the future I'll probably tint it a pretty color using dye that's ok for your skin - I have a bunch of colors for when we make soap.

Sea Salt Body Scrub

Here is a very easy and quick gift you can make out of things you probably have on hand (or it's easy to find the ingredients at the grocery store if you don't).

It just occurred to me that this would also be very good in recipes - it's all natural salt, oil, dried herbs... if you don't want to use it as a body scrub just make some and add a little to a marinade or salad dressing!

To make 2 jars (I think these are half-pint jars, I like that they are wide mouth so it will be easier to scoop the scrub out) mix together 2 cups fine mediterranean sea salt and 1+ Tablespoons Herbs de Provence (store bought mixture of different herbs including rosemary and lavender), then add 1 cup of sunflower oil and mix well (I used my Pampered Chef meat chopping thing to get any lumps out and make sure the mixture is smooth - a spoon would work fine!).

If you don't have those exact ingredients and want to make this using what you have on hand I would substitute table salt and olive oil, then whatever dried herbs you have that seem spa-like (rosemary, thyme, sage, lavender, citrus...).

Put in jars, make a label, tie with a ribbon or twine if you want.



I know just who I'm giving these to, but will keep a secret for now - I'm pretty sure they'll see this!

Hand Painted Wine Glasses

My niece Macey painted these wine glasses for me and I love them! This is a cute creative gift you can personalize for anyone one your list - she made me a set of 4 but you could make as many or few as you want.

She found stemless glasses at a dollar store, you could do it with any type of clear glass (doesn't have to be a wine glass!). Since she knows me so well she designed them with a dog theme - each one is different ("walk with a friend", "learn new tricks", "wag more bark less", and a paw). Paint your design on clean glasses using glass paint; when you are happy with how they look let the glasses air dry for 24 hours and then bake according to the directions on the paint to fully cure them.

The directions say they are dishwasher safe on the top rack but I don't want to risk it and just wash them by hand. Aren't they cute? She did good :)

Personalized Glass Vase

Craft day with my niece - she wanted to make her mom a birthday present and decided on a glass vase that she could personalize.

First we found 2 clear vases (one slightly smaller than the other) and cut a piece of paper to fit around the smaller vase. We then printed a bunch of pictures of her (contact sheet sized), cut them apart, glued them onto the piece of paper and decorated over top of them with stickers (she is 12 so she spelled out "favorite", her sisters didn't find that funny haha!). She finished by wrapping the decorated paper around the smaller vase, held it in place with a small piece of tape, then  put the smaller vase inside the larger one to protect the pictures and keep them dry if the vase is filled with water. An easy, thoughtful, cute gift!