Digging Out

I love it when my husband is home.

I ESPECIALLY love it when my husband is home and he feels like helping clean around the house. What could be more romantic? We've dug our way out of the living room aftermath and even put away almost all of the Christmas stuff. We don't normally worry about doing that so early, but we bought a new keyboard/piano for our family and it needed to go where the tree was, so...we put stuff away early this year.

Now I'm helping Sweetheart find places for her new stuff and sort through old stuff. It seems when new toys are around, they have far less trouble chunking some older stuff. When S goes back to work on Monday I hope that the girls' rooms will be all organized.

Then what will I do???

I haven't even thought past Christmas. I was so busy up until the last minute making homemade Christmas gifts that I realize I have no plan for next week. Well, getting ready for school would be nice....

But I wanted to share with you some of the crafty things I gave this year. I was pretty proud to do so much homemade stuff for the grown ups. (The kids got store-bought toys.) I know it saved us some money and hopefully folks could feel the love put into each gift.

My sisters and sisters-in-law all received this (with custom colors of course):

The soup mix is from this site. The dishtowels I got from here but without all that pesky piecing--I just used one piece of fabric. The criss-cross coasters are from here. And the ornament with my girls' on it is from Sycamore Stirrings. I think it made a pretty nice gift.

Here's a closer shot:

And then I discovered freezer paper stencils! Oh my word the fun I'm gonna have! There are many tutorials online for this, and I didn't use just one, so no link for you. Sorry! Here is the shirt we made my dad:

The girls go down to Grandpa's house several times a week to watch Popeye at 2:00. They love watching that show together. I think his shirt came out nicely.

I made shirts for my sisters too. Here is my oldest sister's shirt with the freezer paper stencil still ironed on.

Here I am starting to peel it off. Sorry there's no final shot--it was a mama and baby giraffe.

Trace, cut out (with manicure scissors--I'm not good with an Exacto knife) and iron on. Stencil, let dry and peel. It comes out so sharp and good! And here is a site with lots of free stencils.

And lastly, my dorky sister. How can you walk into Christmas wearing a shirt that matches the presents you brought AND NOT NOTICE????

Obviously, she likes that pattern. Cracked me up!

Hope your Christmas was great!