Showing posts with label Christmas. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Christmas. Show all posts

Monday, January 9, 2012

Christmas Gifts 2011

I hope you all have been enjoying the holiday season and got what you wanted this year!

Here are the handmade presents my mom got from me:

April Sprinkles: Christmas Gifts 2011: Hooded Scarf

April Sprinkles: Christmas Gifts 2011: Photographer Mittens
The hooded scarf (knitting pattern from Ravelry for free here) and photographer mittens (knitting pattern also from Ravelry, also for free, and available here). The mittens have been heavily modified for my own convenience of doing them two at a time as well as making them into photographer mittens. (The original pattern is for regular mittens.)I added a button hole where I thought her finger would go.


And dad's present:
April Sprinkles: Christmas Gifts 2011: Everything Dad Frame
The poem is "Everything Dad" by Joanna Fuchs. If you can't read it by clicking on the picture here is what the poem reads:
Everything Dad
A little girl needs her daddy
To love her with manly charm,
To soothe her when she’s hurt,
And keep her safe from harm.
A girl needs her dad
To show her a man who’s good,
To help her make right choices,
As only a father could.
A woman needs her father
Just to be aware,
He’ll always be there for her
To sustain her and to care.
You’ve been all these things, Dad.
I hope that you can see
How much I treasure you;
You mean everything to me.
By Joanna Fuchs
 
I thought it was appropriate :) My dad loves getting handmade gifts from me.

Anyway, the story behind this little gem is that I messed up the first version I did. It looked so simple too! :( I tried this tutorial on the Matsutake blog hoping that it would work awesome! Transferring words to a frame making it super customized and therefor super special?? I'm in! But somewhere along the lines, I messed up and it didn't work as well as the tutorial deemed it to be. I did it front and back, both with the same results. Probably because I was impatient and the mod podge was drying too fast... who knows. Anyway, I didn't do it right. So I ended up having to buy an entirely new frame on Christmas eve (and see all my friends at work, lol) and put this little gem together in time for Christmas day. I used this youtube tutorial on how to print on tissue paper, and then mod podged it to a frame that I had painted. Simple enough? I had to wait for all that paint and glue to dry! But I think Dad still likes it :)

These are the presents I got for myself for working so hard at Michael's! Helped that I got a big discount in Winter too ;)

April Sprinkles: Christmas Gifts 2011


And this, ladies, is what I've made recently (just for fun, on my last day of work because apparently THAT is when I get crafty, lol)
April Sprinkles: Chain Maile Bracelet
Besides random jewelry making like this, I'm going to be busy donating lots of my possessions and preparing myself for the move out East! I can't wait to see my marine again :) It has been a long year.

I hope you have all enjoyed the holiday season, I know I did!
April Sprinkles: Christmas Gifts 2011

Keep Cozy

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Christmases past and Gingerbread men

My mom put up our Christmas decorations recently and I saw some of the things that I had made her as presents in past years and thought I would share.

Mr. Gingerbread man
April Sprinkles: Gingerbread Man Lion Brand Pattern
And his gingerbread house
Pattern from Crochet Today! magazine 2009
April Sprinkles: Crochet Gingerbread Hous Crochet Today! Magazine 2009

I also made her this popcorn garland
April Sprinkles: Crochet popcorn garland and cute Christmas tree

I love spoiling my mom!
I wonder what she'll get this year for Christmas? ;)

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Giveaway Time!

So, you all know I'm a really crafty lady, right? But did you know that I suffer from what psychologists simply deem as "scrapbook anxiety"? It's true! (Okay, I'm not sure if the psychologists part is true, but the part I made up sure is!) I'm not very good at scrapbooking. In fact, when my manager suggested that I become "an expert" for the scrapbook area of the store, I politely declined because I honestly know nothing about it. (If you'd have seen the scrapbooks I created in grade school, you would agree with me.) Pretty much, scrapbooks are not my forte, and I had given up on ever understanding them.

Then something unexpected happened. I was contacted recently by Liz from My Memories to do a giveaway of their digital scrapbooking software. I was hesitant at first, thinking about all the horrors of scrapbook mayhem I had concocted in the past (okay, I may be exaggerating a bit there), but once I played around with it I really started to enjoy it! It makes creating scrapbook pages so much easier because you do it all digitally! I really like that, being a Photoshop aficionado and all :) Plus, I can add my own touch of customization to any of the pages! (Even better!) So of course I said yes, and here we are!


Just in case my description of My Memories was confusing, here's the gist:
My Memories is a digital scrapbooking software designed for anyone from total newbs to the superstars of scrapbooking! Everything you need to get started is included in the software, and you can find hundreds of other packs to buy to fill in the gaps and expand your horizons. From my experience, the whole package seems a lot cheaper than physically doing it yourself. And here's my favorite part: they even offer lots of freebies! Everything from background papers and embellishments to text and Quick Pages (that's what they call pages that are already made for you). I've downloaded a bunch of everything already. Plus, with My Memories, you can save whole albums, convert them to .jpg so you can share them anywhere digitally, and print your scrapbooking pages. But wait, there's more! (lol) I've heard that you can make blog headers easily, as well as holiday cards with My Memories Suite. In fact, I've whipped up a little holiday card of myself and Mr. Marine to show you an example:

That was created using some basic tools, quite a bit of tweaking, and general knowledge of the software. Not bad, eh?

It took a bit of getting use to the interface before I was comfortable exploring my creative side, but once I got the basics down, I really enjoyed it. So much easier than doing it in real life, if you ask me! No mess!

Let's face it, most of us are digital people, and printed photos aren't something we concern ourselves with anymore. If you've ever wanted to try digital scrapbooking software for yourself, or just like to get things for free (hey, I'm not judging you!) then I've got a giveaway for you! I'm giving away a copy of MyMemories Suite Digital Scrapbooking Software v 2.0 to a very lucky reader! And since this is my first giveaway, I want it to be big and fun!

Feel free to use this button to spread the word!
I made it using (you guessed it!) My Memories.




Here's how to enter:

Mandatory:
  • Be a follower of my blog with a Google account or Twitter and leave a link to your account and your e-mail address
    Optional for extra entries:
    1. Go to https://www.mymemories.com/, check out their selection of papers/packs, then come back here and leave a comment telling me which one(s) you liked the best
    2. Blog about this giveaway, or mention it using the icon above and leave the link to the post.

    3. Like MyMemories on Facebook

    4. Follow @MyMemoriesSuite on Twitter

    5. Subscribe to My Memories blog
    *Please leave one comment for each individual entry
    + your e-mail address*

    Giveaway will end November 23 at 9pm Pacific time (12 AM for you East coasties) ;)

    Also: if you've already won or have the My Memories software, you can still enter and pass the code on to someone else as a gift! (Again, so not judging you! lol)

    Along with the giveaway, I got my own Share the memories code for you to use! Just in case you don't win, but still want to try out My Memories. (Or if you want to get some neat swag for a discount price!)


    Use code: STMMMS87475

    The code will provide $10 off the purchase of the My Memories Suite Digital Scrapbook software and a $10 coupon for the MyMemories.com store. (A $20 value)

    I'm really excited because this is my first giveaway and I hope that it goes off without a hitch :)
    It's really fun, and totally worth it if you win so please enter and pass it along! Hey, what have you got to lose?

    Disclaimer: I did not receive monetary compensation for this blog post, but I did get a complimentary copy of My Memories software to try and review as well as one to give away to a reader. The only time I will be compensated is when someone uses the code to purchase something from My Memories because I'm spreading the world about their merchandise and company. 

    Thanks for stopping by!

      Thursday, September 15, 2011

      Merry Christmas! (3 months early...)

      April Sprinkles: Merry Christmas! (3 months early...)

      So I may not be entirely prepared for Christmas yet (presents have not been made, etc.), but at least I have this hat!

      April Sprinkles: Merry Christmas! (3 months early...)

      The hat is from last year's Christmas episode of Big Bang Theory. (I wish I had a good picture from the episode I could share, but I don't want to pirate it!) I thought it was adorable and it was definitely on my to-do list for this years holiday crafting. I found the pattern on Ravelry.

      It didn't take me that long to knit.. it only took me a long time to fluff out those pom-poms and then eventually take pictures, lol.

      Thanks for reading
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