Crafts

I made a bunch of crafts to give as gifts this year for the holidays. Thought I'd share a few.

"recipe in a jar" thingys - basically the dry ingredients to a cookie, bread/muffin, soup, etc. recipe and then whomever you give the jar to only needs to add the wet ingredients to have a yummy treat. The top is easy to decorate with fabric and ribbon and a cute tag with the recipe written on the back.


Glass mosaic candle holders. These are a bit of work because you have to find a good source for colored glass that isn't too expensive, I found a place to get "scraps" so it's cheap. The rest is easy.


A gift basket I put together for a friend. She's a big tea drinker and so I got a little tea pot and some good tea, then one of my candle holders and two of my jars.


I love homemade gifts! Anyone else have any ideas to share?

WOW!!! I am impressed. You are very talented!!

I make beaded necklaces but that's about it.

Those are awesome!!

Great ideas.

Do you think you could post the 'how to' instructions on the glass mosaics? That is one of my favorite items, and i've always wanted to know how to do it.
I'd love any insight.

Wow, you are very talented! I agree, I would love to hear about how to make the mosaics - I know of a store here that sells the bits and pieces but making them, I have no idea how.

I made little sock snowmen to give to everyone at my church. When we drew names, I got the name of a young girl who really looks up to me, so I am giving her the cat quilt that I posted pics of awhile back.Thats about it this year.

I love your candleholders! They are beautiful, but I don't think I have the patience to do them.

Wow! They look like you put a lot of work into them, there'll be some happy people come Christmas Day.

Thank you everyone for your nice comments! I have so much fun making crafts and it's nice to have a place to share them with others, and get ideas from all of the other crafters here.

Daniela and Kellye, I'm sorry I didn't respond sooner - I was away for the weekend and then I got engaged yesterday! The glass mosaic crafts are very easy and I will post the instructions tonight I promise!

Hey congratulations on your engagement!

Wow! Those are crafts that I actually wouldn't mind getting! All this time I thought I didn't like crafts. My crafting friends could learn a thing or two from you.

I just remembered to post about the glass mosaic!

So you need: colored glass sheets or pieces of flat colored glass (I was able to get scraps for cheap at a stained glass art store), a cutter tool*, eye glasses or goggles for safety, glass or tile glue in clear (comes in a tube from the hardware store), tile grout (in powder form) in whatever color you think will go with your colored glass (I used antique white), and lastly, whatever glass candle holder or vase you would like to use. I spent less than $20 for everything not including the actual glasses I used to make the candle holders. Thrift stores are great to pick up glasses or vases.

*I had wanted to take a pic of the main tool you use, but it's just called a glass cutter/scorer and I got mine for about $4 at the local hardware store. It looks almost like a pair of pliers with a little round blade on the top end of the tool.

1. You need to cut the glass into small pieces, the smaller the better if you're vase or candle holder is rounded. You can follow the instructions on the cutters, but basically you wear your goggles and either go outside or to a place where you can clean up any slivers of glass that might end up on the floor. Lay the glass on a towel so it doesn't slip. Then start running the round blade on the tool down the glass in a straight line while pressing down fairly hard to score the glass. If you don't see a white line then you probably weren't using enough pressure. You need to score from end to end in a straight line. Then you use the plier-like part of the tool to grip the end of the glass lining up the plier heads on the score line and squeeze - this should break the glass all along the score line. You repeat this until you have many thin strips of glass (maybe 1/4 inch wide), and then you score each of those into little squares. Use the tool to break the glass, etc. to get small pieces.

2. Cover a small space at a time with glue on your glass object and start putting the glass pieces on, making sure to leave room in between each piece for the grout later on. Do this a little at a time so that your glue doesn't dry before you are ready to put glass pieces on it. Let this dry for as long as the glue package says is needed.

3. Mix your grout powder with water according to directions. I used my fingers to spread globs of the grout all over the glass making sure every space got filled in. I did the entire piece messily, and then as it's starting to firm up went back and formed and smoothed the top and bottom edges. Lastly before you let it dry use a dry cloth or towel to clean the excess grout off. It doesn't need to be perfect, but you want it to be smooth and somewhat clean. Leave to dry overnight.

4. As a final step I used a brillo pad to clean mine so that the glass pieces were really clear of the fine grout dust and film that remained.

PM me if anyone is going to try this and I can share pictures of the tools or steps if you'd like.

WOW great gifts . You did a great job on all of your crafts .

Sunni Jean, those gifts! I love the idea of the recipe in a jar! The mosaic glass also looks great!

I also love to make gifts and to get ideas for them!
I don´t where time went this year, but next year....

Wow! What super gift ideas, especially the recipe in thejar, NOW that's a great idea!