I know it's ridiculous, but we usually buy for about 45 people at Christmas! I have a lot of siblings, and most of our parents/grandparents are still living. Obviously this is a huge financial strain on us and will be more so now that I am not working at much and we have a new baby. We would like to make something as part of school for family members, like candles, blankets, or birdhouses or something. Does anyone have any suggestions for gifts we could make (I have a 9yr old and a 5yr old) that would be fairly inexpensive and sort of personalized to give to family? Thanks!
My family is full of "foodies". I thought about personalizing aprons for the kids. Last year I took some black and white photos around my parents' home that represented the letters in their last name. (Think tractor tire was an "O") If you have a long last name, the framing can get expensive, but if it is a shorter name you can usually find frames easily enough and half price at Hobby Lobby. Another option is to frame each picture as a single to be hung in a row. Very, very cheap that way at Walmart. If you use stained wood frames, just print the pics in sepia instead of black and white.
gifts in a jar are nice, and you can have the kids decorate the jars. Also bath salts, or sugar scrubs are popular with the ladies. If you do a search in the house and home forum you'll find lots of great ideas that the ladies here have done over the years.
YES! We make candy and goodies and decorate either pickle or cookie jars or Large Coffee cans with Christmasy themes, you can do wrapping paper, or stickers ( scrapbooking does wonders for supplies) We have made decorated lids with home made clay that dries, but you can do almost anything for that with beans, or rice colored with paint or food coloring. If you sew you can make a ton of things, make cozies for things .. coffee cup holders, no sew blankets are great and easy enough for the kids to make, you could even have smaller ones tie the nots for pillow cases to go with blankets. You can do no sew vests for grand parents or younger kids, or even book bags! Imagine a preschool/kindergarden gift as a home made book bag and some books inside! Oh oh! how about a bookbag, books and a small sized pillow to lay on a floor or couch and read? It could be themed as the book in the bag. There are a tone of ready to make kids projects at Jo Ann fabrics online, its a com. The ideas are endless!
I made a collection of my mil's Christmas Cookie recipes one year. It went over VERY well. This year, I bought my soon-to-be (hopefully!) dil two Pampered Chef Stoneware Loaf Pans. Two, because most bread recipes will make two loaves, and splurging to buy me two instead of one (I considered long and hard on that!) was one of the best decisions I've ever made! So, along with the pans, I plan on giving her the recipes for different breads...my Amish Country White Bread, Strawberry Bread, Apple Pie Bread, Peach Bread, etc., printed out on cards or maybe in a little book...?
goodie bags are great for family and friends... make a bunch of cookies, candies and give to the families... aprons for the grandparents with the kids hand prints sounds fun... for those ladies you can make sugar scrubs, bubble baths, etc... Pinterest is a great site to find some cool gift craft ideas!!
The sugar scrubs I make are basically 2 parts sugar (I like brown, or raw the best) 1 part beauty oil (olive is ok, but jojoba, fractionated coconut, sweet almond, or grapeseed work even better) and either a handful of dried herbs (lavender is a favorite) or a few drops of essential oil for fragrance. If you will be storing it for longer than a week or so Add the contents of one punctured vitamin E capsule as a preservative.
I make fruit baskets as gifts...then again I did it for years in a retail setting. It might be a little hard for someone who doesn't have formal training to make them look professional, but who out there doesn't like fruit? Especially if you add special touches to it, candy, nuts, little jelly jars. Some customers of mine even liked me to put tiny liquor bottles in them, although that would obviously vary from person to person.
Cookies! Or pumpkin cranberry bread YUMMMMM! How about a personalized calendar for the grandparents. you could do fingerprint art,pictures,handprints whatever your kids wanted to put on them.. A differant one for each month.. We did this for my MIL one year and she LOVED it!! Do a google search for the calendar pages print them out and hole punch them then use yarn to bind them.. Or you could take them to be spiral bound at the office supply store.. We marked the calender with their birthdays and special days to remember throughout the year..
OH I am so excited! dd and I went to Jo Ann and got some candy molds with our teacher card we got 15 % off of sale price that had been 2.99 -25% so we did good! We have big trees, little trees snow flakes and I forget what else I got last time haha, FUN ! we will need peppermint to make some minty ones, so probably will get some cheap candy canes to munch up in the trees..
Sweatshirts/t-shirts with hand prints for g'mas is also popular. Or, a nice frame with a picture of all the g'kids in it.
I am not sure if someone already mentioned this or not but you could make up some jars (decorated mason jars) with dry soup mixes in them. :angel:
One of my favorite things in my whole house is a framed poem about how we are more rude to our family than to strangers. When I'm having a bad day with the kids, it puts things in perspective. It was hand made with scrapbook supplies for less than $3.00. Also, ds made tye-dye type christmas ornaments for the tree with clear glass bulbs. All you do is dump in different color paint, turn upside down and swirl till it is all covered. Very easy and very cool. You can also get a paint pen and write the year or anything on the outside. I LOVE homemade gifts! Debbie
Well I guess nobody calls them bulbs but our family. The glass balls that you hang on the tree. Buy them in clear. I found a similar youtube video but I can't post the link yet. Search marbled holiday ornaments Beverly's how to. We dumped each color in the bottom and turned upside down and swirled. It comes out looking tye-dyed. Debbie
