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A Zero-Budget Christmas: Homemade Gifts

Zero-Budget Christmas

A Zero-Budget Christmas

Part 6: Homemade gifts-help for the DIY challenged

We’re continuing our Zero-Budget Christmas series with an entire post on one of the best ways to give thoughtfully with little money: creating homemade gifts.

Those of you who are crafty or creative love homemade gifts. You’re probably knee-deep in fabric scraps and Mason jars right now.

But if Christmas came around before your glue gun was warmed up, you might not be feeling the DIY vibe this year. Or perhaps you are not a crafty type of person. For those of you who can’t find your way out of a Hobby Lobby, making homemade gifts can be overwhelming.

This post is for you. Even if Pinterest gives you heart palpitations and you have very few days left to create any sort of Christmas magic, you can have a stash of homemade gifts ready in no time. Here’s how:

DIY Christmas

You do not have to be crafty or creative in order to make some great gifts. I did an entire series on this blog called Simply Homemade, which I created for people who don’t think they can make homemade gifts. These are simple, inexpensive, and very fast projects, yet they are gifts anyone can make and everyone would love to receive. Head there for instant inspiration!

Host a homemade gift exchange. Maybe you only know how to make one thing. You can knit a scarf or tie a fleece blanket, and everyone on your list has already gotten a million of those things from you. Here’s your solution: a DIY gift swap.

Everyone who attends makes multiples of one gift—their DIY specialty—to give to every other attendee. In exchange, they get a homemade gift from every other attendee. If six friends attend, that means each person leaves with six unique gifts to give—but each person only had to make one. Genius.

Make a craft kit. This is perfect if you’re short on time. Craft kits are hot items to buy, but the contents usually leave much to be desired. You can DIY a better kit on a lower budget. Choose a project, pre-measure or gather the supplies (you can use craft store coupons to save a bundle), and print the instructions. Package everything in a cute box and you’re done! This is perfect for the person who loves to craft but ran out of time to physically make the gifts.

You can even get your friends together to assemble craft kits assembly-line style to save even more time and money. Parse out the supply list so everyone brings something, and everyone goes home with something! As a bonus, you’ll get to spend time with friends during the hectic holiday season.

Homemade gift ideas

Give the gift of gourmet. Freezer meals. Homemade monkey bread. Peanut brittle. These are all food gifts that rock. Who wouldn’t want to get a homemade lasagna to stick in the freezer for a crazy Christmas night?! Food gifts are awesome because, as far as I know, we all need to eat. And we all like it.

But, if your culinary skills are lacking, you can hack this idea by creating food mixes. Similarly to the idea above, simply assemble the ingredients, print some directions, and package everything up in Mason jars.

One year, I made mocha mix and homemade marshmallows to give. Another year, it was dry soup mixes. Search Pinterest and you’ll find a million cookie-in-a-jar mixes. The best part is, you don’t have to bake a thing.

Don’t forget to use coupons and online apps such as Ibotta to save on the ingredients or earn money back on the stuff you’ll buy anyway (roll those savings into some Christmas capital for next year). Walmart has a fantastic curbside delivery service in many areas, and if you haven’t used them before, you can save $10 on your first order. And it is. the. bomb.

Stick with tradition. If creativity is not your jam, pick one thing you can make, and make it every year.

My mother-in-law makes the most amazing cinnamon rolls. It’s something we look forward to every year. If she ever stops doing it, there will be a revolt. A pan of her cinnamon rolls is a fantastic gift, and exactly what we all hope she’ll make.

Growing up, one of my aunts made hard candy every year and gave it away in jars. I don’t remember most of the gifts I got as a child, except for the really special ones, but I remember jars of Aunt Carolyn’s “Rock Candy,” as we called it.

Make a tradition of the one thing you do well and your people will look forward to it all year long.

Assemble gift baskets. Alright. So, you can’t craft and you can’t bake. Don’t worry–gift baskets are where you can shine. Pick a theme, like Movie Night, Cookies and Cocoa, Spa Day, Dig in the Dirt (gardening stuff), Snow Day—the sky’s the limit—and gather items that fit the theme. Scope out your local thrift store for inexpensive baskets, or use things like dollar store laundry baskets, storage bins, or even wrapped shoe boxes to create a container for your goodies.

Then fill it up! A movie night theme basket could include things like DVDs (shop your own collection or get some great finds secondhand), microwave popcorn, box candy, glass bottles of soda, and straws. A spa basket could include candles, a classical music CD, lotions, a loofah sponge, and a good book.

The best part about gift baskets is you can shop all year using coupons to put together very inexpensive themed gifts. You can even use these as family gifts (try a Game Night theme) so you can knock out that Christmas list even faster.

Homemade Christmas ideas

The bottom line is, anyone can make homemade gifts. Just have fun with it. Even if your projects don’t turn out quite the way you had hoped, your thoughtfulness and love for the recipient will shine through.

And isn’t that what Christmas giving is all about?

To begin reading A Zero-Budget Christmas from the beginning, start here.

**During this series, affiliate links may be included for your convenience.

We’re Expecting!

I have been dying to tell you the wonderful news: Five in Tow is about to grow! Jeff and I are excited to announce that we’re expecting.

I know you probably thought we were done having children. Five certainly is a handful, at least that’s what the Costco sample ladies tell me when my kids clear out their toothpicked cheese cubes in one fell swoop.

There’s also the small part about how motherhood didn’t come easy to me. It took me about…well, five kids to get broken in to this gig, and for some time prior to that, I threatened to pack up my children and send them to Argentina.

But, this child, this sixth child, is something different. This child is not growing in my womb. This child has been growing in my heart since I was old enough to notice that not all children have it good.

Not all children are safe.

Not all children are wanted.

Not all children are loved.

And not all people who can do something about it are. Including me.

Many years ago, before I was married, I wanted to adopt all the babies. I had lived in third world countries and worked with street children and orphans. By the time I was nineteen, I had seen more unwanted children than I could bear. I determined to do something about it.

But then I got married. And pregnant. And pregnant again, and…every time I thought about adding another child to our home, life would get crazy and I would wonder what on earth I was thinking.

I began to believe that I really am terribly busy, and I have used those Costco ladies as my justification for passing up many opportunities to be Christ to this hurting world. I have my hands full already, thankyouverymuch.

But God’s been talking to me about being the Word, and it’s all terribly more self-sacrificial than I am comfortable with.

So I read all through the Word looking for some fine print that would exempt me from anything harder than where I am right now. What I found was Jesus telling poor people to care for poorer people. Jesus telling busy people to stop and bind up the wounds of the hurting. Jesus telling moms who pounded out their daily bread to feed the widows and the orphans with some of it. Jesus saying, “Hey, the harvest is ready, but the trouble is, none of you are willing to stop what you’re doing and labor for me.”

So we stopped. We prayed. We talked to our kids. We did the next thing, and the next thing more. Now, we are knee-deep in the foster licensing process with the intention of adopting a child out of the system. We have to get the licensing part done before Jeff deploys, which is so insane, our case worker is developing a twitch. But we have a set of fire extinguishers in our kitchen and fingerprints on file and a whole lot of friends and family with permanent hand cramps because they had to fill out pages of references forms on us.

It is labor, all of it. But with the labor comes great expectation, abundant joy, and a good share of nausea.

I hear that’s normal for expectant parents.

Hopefully, we can act like a normal family for a few weeks longer so we can wrap up the foster-licensing process. Jeff will deploy, and even though it’s not ideal to welcome a new child to the home while the father is away, we’re kind of over waiting for ideal. When it comes to foster care, there is no ideal.

Our hope is to foster-adopt, so we are praying that the Lord will bring us the right child right away so that we can begin the legal process as quickly as possible. Jeff will be getting orders to a new duty station soon after he completes his deployment, and we need to complete the adoption while we’re still living in Texas…or we might lose the child and have to start the whole thing all over again.

But even if we cannot adopt, we are thrilled to have the opportunity to love and invest in another child for as long as God lets us have her. When you think about it, that’s really what parenting is all about.

Won’t you pray for us? We’re expecting God to show up big time because this whole thing is crazy-scary and infinitely bigger than us. Those are exactly the circumstances God seems to like the most, when I have nothing of my own to offer and He gets to remind me why He’s God, and I’m not.

Pray particularly for this sixth child who may, at this very moment, be experiencing unspeakable trauma at the hands of those who are supposed to love him. Pray pray for the family who is so broken, a child isn’t safe in their care. Finally, pray that we will remain steadfast and diligent as we labor to make room for one more.

Six in tow? I kinda like the sound of that.

Make an Etched Mirror, Plus a Giveaway!!!

I love old stuff. I love the dusty smell the years leave behind and the memories tucked into things that have lasted long beyond their owners.

I particularly love old mirrors, the kind that have real silver on the backs and bubbles in the glass and hand-glued labels on the wood. I haul them home whenever I can, and my husband gives me that husband look that says he doesn’t appreciate blurry, wrecked mirrors the way I do and he wonders if we don’t already have enough already?

As if.

One of the mirrors I scavenged was from a church garage sale. It was framed with barn boards and the silver was delightfully scratched and it weighed about half as much as me. I lugged it home and when my husband rolled his eyes, I said, “Don’t worry. I’m going to do something with this.”

Which, in point of fact, was not the part that worried him.

My plan was to make an etched mirror. For years, I toyed around with what to do. I even bought supplies to make my own stencil, but I couldn’t quite find the right thing and I was a little afraid I would ruin the mirror (never mind the fact that my husband thought it was too late for that).

So, I was thrilled when I turned on my computer one day and found a link a friend shared to Fruitful Vine Creations. They make gorgeous vinyl wall decals in every shape and size, including the one below.

Micah 6:8 happens to be one of my favorite verses. I even named a child after that book of the Bible. I was in love.

The size of this decal was perfect for my mirror. I knew I could affix the vinyl piece to it and the hardest part of my glass-etching project would be done for me!

Best of all, this particular letter art was being featured that week as the company’s Fruitful Deal. Every week, they offer one vinyl letter design at a deep discount. I scored this design for 50% off!

Once my order arrived, I positioned the vinyl decal on my mirror.

Then, I secured the design with tape on one edge and peeled the back off. This way, I could flip the design back onto the glass. (All the directions are included in the package, and they are super easy to follow, so don’t worry if that part doesn’t make sense. It will when you see their step-by-step tutorial).

I squeegeed the design onto the glass, pushing out air bubbles and making sure the design was stuck on tight. Since I was going to be applying glass etching acid to the top of this vinyl, I wanted to make sure all the edges were sealed.

Once that was done, I carefully pulled the top sheet off. The decal was perfectly positioned underneath.

Now it was time to get to work with the etching.

To etch glass at home, all you need is glass etching goo. This is what I used to do the job. This is the link to the product description on my Amazon affiliate page. But, it’s crazy expensive. I highly recommend using a coupon and getting it at your local craft store if you can. I got mine at Hobby Lobby for 40% off.

Using a paint brush, smear that stuff all over the mirror, right on top of the vinyl, until it is evenly coated.

The product is a little lumpy. Ignore.

The directions on the Armour Etch say to leave the product on for 60 seconds. I tested this with a smaller bottle and that amount of time was not nearly sufficient. Maybe it’s because my mirror is very old and things were made better back in the day. I don’t know. But I had to go back and purchase another bigger bottle and try again.

Bother.

I let it sit for about fifteen minutes, or until I could see the glass was cloudy underneath. Then, I washed off the creme, cleaned the mirror, and let it dry.

You will notice that the glass-etching product did not take evenly. Grrr…I am telling myself that the variations in cloudiness are in keeping with the weathered look of the mirror. I may go back and purchase another jar of Armour Etch if I decide not to leave my children an inheritance.

You will also notice that the vinyl looks just as good as it did before I applied the acid. In fact, a simple design might be able to be used again.

For me, it was time to remove the vinyl letters and see if the etching worked.

It did!

This particular design from Fruitful Vine Creations is very delicate, so I was a little worried that the acid might get underneath the thin parts. It didn’t. The vinyl stuck tight, just like it was supposed to, and gave me beautiful, crisp lines.

It’s hard to tell because the mirror creates a double image, but the lines are so clean. You can even feel them with your fingers, just like on real etched-glass.

I love the way the Scripture verse looks on the mirror. The light catches the words in different ways at different times, and it is beautiful. Even my husband has to admit that this old mirror isn’t so bad.

Aren’t you all dying to get your hands on some vinyl letter art so you can create your own etched mirror masterpiece???

You are in luck! I contacted Tonya over at Fruitful Vine Creations and told her what amazing readers I have and how much you all would love to shop on her site. She offered to give you all a chance to win a $50 shopping spree from Fruitful Vine Creations! This gift certificate can be used on anything in their store, including shipping! The only exclusions are the My Fruitful Deal decals (which are already a smashing great price, you might just want to sign up for their sale e-mails so you don’t miss any).

To enter, just fill out the Rafflecopter below! I will draw a winner at 6 pm Monday, April 14. Enjoy!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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