Owen's Quiet Book Pages 8 & 9

Owen loves Christmas and even asked for a Christmas tree party for his birthday so I just 

had to make a Christmas tree page in his book.

The plans:

Christmas tree page plan:

Christmas Wreath page plan:

Felt patterns print sheet for Christmas pages:

The Christmas Tree Page:

This page was so much fun to do. I found the christmas lights at Fabricland and the rick-rack garland came out of a package of notions I found at my local thrift store. I doubled up all the felt as in previous pages to give it more weight and for the pot I used fabric and left the edges a little rough for texture.

The bows on the presents can be untied and retied even though it might be a little hard 

for a child it is fun for a parent to do this with them.

            I made some ornaments for the tree. The angels were simple felt shapes. the candy canes

           are made with stiffened white felt and narrow ribbon. The green balls were printed on

 fabric, as in previous posts, because I liked the pattern on them and they are so small 

that it would be hard to make them this detailed.

Owen can decorate the tree. The ornaments attach with small velcro dots. 

The presents open with snaps and there are small treasures inside attached with ribbons.

I found these cute little nativity buttons at fabric land and made a little felt stable to

 put them in. I padded the stable to make the backs of the button sink in a bit.

The garland can detach and be woven through the small plastic loops (stitch markers for knitting)

.

The garland has a thin piece of velcro on it which matches the piece just under the corner of the tree.

I really like how this page turned out!


The Wreath Page:

The same decorations are used for the wreath page. It also has small velcro dots. The  

`double felt pocket is lined with interfacing and works well to hold all the decorations.

I hope this gives you some inspiration for your Christmas quiet book page.

Happy Sewing!

Is it Christmas again?

As I begin preparing for Christmas I realized that I hadn't shared my decor from last year 

      so I decided to do it now. I hope it will inspire you in your Christmas decorating.

Red, white and turquoise Christmas tree

                             One of my favourite things is decorating my table. I wanted to use 

                                                as many of my vintage dishes as I could.

Vintage Red, Pink and Turquoise table for Christmas

Vintage christmas table

My china is Wedgwood "Chester"  

 The pink and aqua serving dishes are vintage Pyrex.

Pyrex for Christmas

       

                The glassware is vintage in pink and turquoise.

Christmas table favors and place  cards

I made small boxes and place card tags with 2 truffles in each for table favors.
They coordinate with my centerpiece in pattern and colour.

DIY Christmas angel

The angels for my table centerpiece started with a pattern from THIS 

blog.

I changed the face and the colours and added some "bling" 

in the form of paste gems.

DIY Christmas table centerpiece

Inside the angels there are flameless candles.

Here is the pattern:

Angel Pattern

If you would like it in pdf format just comment and I will send it to you.

The chandelier was decorated with a mix of vintage and new decorations in

red, pink and turquoise.

Christmas decor Chandelier

In the center of the chandelier there are some vintage" sugar bells ".

This year I am working on something very different and look forward to sharing it soon.

Have fun decorating! 

DIY Christmas Crackers (with tutorial)

DIY Christmas Crackers

This past Christmas I wanted to use my collection of vintage pink pyrex 

serving dishes and since it seemed very difficult to find pink crackers 

I decided to make my own. I will make an effort here to share how I did it.

I cut cardboard wrapping paper tubes to the size I wanted (4 inches) and made smaller
 tubes(2 inches) to use as stiffeners for  the ends while attaching the paper (they are
 removed after rolling). I cut the paper 10 inches long and wide enough to overlap
slightly on the cardboard tube(4 inches for the main part-4 inches for the end
parts and 2 extra inches to make room for tying).

I made a 2 inch cardboard template to fold the paper over so that the
inside of the rolls would look finished (I will admit that I might be a little ocd)

A glue gun works well for sealing the paper but if

 you don't have one you could just use scotch tape.

You can make your own paper hats or purchase them. I followed a pattern 

from a hat I had kept from a commercial cracker. You can make it entirely 

with tissue paper. I used silver wrapping paper for the front half of mine. 

You need to fold it small to fit in the cracker.

I thought maybe I could put the treats in before wrapping but it didn't
work well. It is best to put the treats in after tying one end. After
you have filled the tubes tie the other end tight with the ribbon or twine.

The cracker jokes were found  HERE.

I printed them to match my theme and laminated them with self-laminating sheets from Staples.

 I also made small bookmarks the same way. Normal size bookmarks
were too big for my crackers. It's a good idea to use the smaller end
tubes and gently push to make the paper shape before tying.
There are patterns out there for cutting card stock to make
crackers that fold easier as well.

A good idea is to put a dot of glue under
 the cracker snap at each end so that
 when the cracker is pulled it pops.

I used my decorative punches to make borders on pink vellum (a 1 inch piece for each

 end and a 2 inch piece for the middle section) and to make snowflakes from silver 

glitter paper. The papers came from Michaels. The snowflakes were finished with
an adhesive backed faux rhinestone(dollarama).  The vellum and the snowflakes
 were then glued onto the front of the cracker

Pink and Silver Christmas Cracker

A place setting Including DIY place cards.

The idea came from HERE.

The finished Pink table

Have Fun Creating!

I Love Christmas ( and this one was no exception)

Peace Tree

For some reason the Peace Ornament caught the light and I thought it was so

 fitting I had to share it. It is a turquoise ornament so it was a bit of a fluke.

My hubby was just fooling around with light . The color really looks like this:

Family room Christmas decor.

Surprised kids are so much fun!

I love to decorate my Christmas Table I will share more of this(including the 

DIY Christmas crackers and all the vintage elements) on another post.

Pink Christmas Table

 Brown sugar cookies with royal icing

Whipped shortbread and chocolate filled walnut cookies.

Chess Squares

Living room window.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas. 

Wishing you all a Happy 2013!