A Home Made Christmas

Pennies have been tight this year at TheMadHouse, so we have put our heads together and made as much as we can.

Rice and Lavender hot pad with removable cover

 

Felt pocket tissue cover

 

Home made tea cup candles

 

Basic wrapping with brown paper, wool, string and ribbon  - I am of the opinion that good packaging detracts from the homemade feel

 

I tied home made gingham and mother of pearl hearts to the wrapping.

We  had printed postcards of some photo's we had taken over the year at Moo.

I made pouches to hold them

The minimads decorated 90p shoppings bags from Hobbycraft

 

I made unique appliqué book bags for my neices.

Filled with home made crayon rolls

Paint brush and water colour rolls

and pen rolls

We included a good pad of artists paper in their bags too.

We made pear butter from gifted pears over the summer

The boys made calenders

We supplemented the gifts with some fantastic charity shop finds (Father Christmas Cushions 50p brand new)

All in all, I am really proud of what we managed to achieve over a short space of time, with little on the resource front.  The thing is that it has all been made with love and the person receving the gifts.

 

Kirtie's HandMade Christmas - Rant Alert

Now I love Kirstie with the rest of the country, but I feel a little reality check is required here.

I was really looking forward to this and have waited until viewing all three episodes before letting rip.  I was hopiong to be able to watch it and get useful, practical, inexpensive, handmade ideas for Chritmas and maybe that was were I was going wrong.

Yes it was beautiful, the artisans were increadably talented, but cheap it wasn't!!  Gold leafing a pear, what a precious waste of good fruit, in addition to a frivolous, not make that mad way to spend £38 on a book of 24 carrot gold.  Dear lord that would buy most peoples turkey for the big day.

I was also starting to bubble when it came to the candle making.  There are much easier and less expensive ways for people to give candle making a go nowadays.  You only need use soy wax, take a look at my post on Tea Cup candles and  see whicks n whacks for suberb and value candle making kits.  Yes they looked stunning, but who has 3 weeks to let things set and then time to top them up and melt the tops to make them all even.

Oh and do not get me started on that poor bear - £75 for the mohair, MadDad nearly fell off his seat.  He has just received a wonderful bear from Abby at Mutterings from the Moor a very reasonable price he tells me, which he has put away for my birthday.

Then let me move on to the soap, it doesn't have to take 6 weeks or however long to set and involve all those ingredients.  Just take a look here at the wonderful Violet Posy's blog and how she and her daughter made soap for Christmas this year.  I wouldnt let my children near any sort of acid!!

Right I am going to step down off my high horse and go and take a look at all the Thrifty Christmas Ideas which were posted at Violet Posy's.  You know you could do a whole lot of more economical and excellent gifts if you do too!!

I guess my idea and Kirstie's idea of homemade differ somewhere along the way, plus please Channel 4 can I have some of these wonderful people to come and finnish off all the projects I start!