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Surprisingly handmade

I didn't take the Handmade Pledge but I do try to make many of my gifts. Mr. H is the same way. And now our parents are in on it. A sampling of the awesome, handmade loot!

My father-in-law welded (brazed?) these incredible copper roosters. He made a whole flock; three for my mother-in-law and one each for friends and family. SO COOL! He is incredibly talented, sorry the photos are so bad.

Not to be outdone, my mother-in-law drew my name (we draw names for gifts and only give to one person each). Anyway, she made me this amazing, flannel, Christmas quilt. (product testing by Mr. H who was, unfortunately, feeling sick all Christmas Day.)

Mr. H and Biscuit made me a cool photobook on iPhoto and my dad made photo cd's for my in-laws. My mom and Biscuit made a necklace for me and an "all about me" book where Biscuit describes her favorite colors as: pink, purple, brown and black and drew a fine picture of what my mom interpreted to be a pinecone but is actually a porcupine. No idea why she couldn't tell when Biscuit called it a "pinecorn."  Mr. H made my mom and sister and his mom walnut bowls on the new lathe and made my dad a cutting board.

Moving on to what I actually made and have been anxious to share. My favorite was a gift for my mom, an embroidery "sampler" of Biscuit's alphabet (and name but I blurred that).

It's hand embroidered from tracings of Biscuit's letters and then machine pieced with a wonky, scrappy, log cabin pattern and hand quilted. This is one of those things that, as I was making it, I could imagine, eventually inheriting it and passing it on to Biscuit.

I also made a few other odds and ends but I'll save it for another post. Hope you have enjoyed a relaxing, post holiday weekend.

Finally, if you have a blog and you've updated lately, leave me a comment. This whole thing where the internet is "taking a holiday from blogging" is killing me. I need new content, people ;)

Merry Christmas!

Two Santas:
 

Biscuit finally likes Santa! For the first time she didn't cry when Santa visited Grammy and Papa's house for a quick Christmas Eve visit. Then Santa #2 spent hours assembling the train set. If she doesn't like it, at least Mr. H will. We are so good at getting Biscuit gifts we want for ourselves. Typewriter, anyone?

And a quick funny before I forget.

In the car on the way to Grammy and Papa's for Christmas Eve dinner

Biscuit: Is it Christmas today?
Mommy: One more day!
B: Who's birthday is it? (not sure where that came from, we aren't religious and haven't gotten into the Christmas story).
M: Well, I guess it's Jesus' birthday.
B: Jeezit?
M (to Mr. H): Jeezit like Cheezit!

Maybe that was only funny to us?

However you celebrate, hope your holiday is happy.

Score! (alternate title: A Christmas miracle for my alphabet obsessed daughter)

Click to enlarge photo. Please excuse typos; computers have spoiled me.

Things that are awesome (an incomplete list)

Anna-Mae's custom stamp business, Village Impressions. If you need one-off custom "rubber" stamps I highly recommend her. The prices are the best I've found and the customer service and responsiveness were incredible. (and the product was just what I expected).

Lauren's free mouse pattern at Pimp Stitch. This totally saved the day when Plan A fell apart and I needed something mouse-themed pronto.

Alicia's book, Stitched in Time, which had a MUCH better idea than my original plan for a photo memory card game.

Printed Treasures fabric sheets that go through an ink jet printer. The quality is better than I was expecting and I love JoAnn's 40% off coupons. Also, a pinking blade for your rotary cutter.

Biscuit asking to do some sewing.

That's probably enough for one evening. Could I get an extra day before Christmas? That would be super awesome!

Still making (semi frantically at this point)

But enjoying a fire on this rainy day and leftover wine from our holiday gathering yesterday. A few sneak peeks....

 

Sure beats the mall!

Pre-school teacher gift

Yes, of course Biscuit's teachers are getting jam (everyone is getting jam) but I wanted to do jam plus a little something. When Biscuit's teacher commented on the yummy looking granola bars I was sending in her lunch it gave me an idea. I figure everyone likes food and semi-healthy food is a good thing during the holidays!

Biscuit and I made up a batch of bars and I individually wrapped and labeled them. Then I printed the recipe on cardstock and I'll put a few bars and the recipe in a brown paper lunch sack, have Biscuit write their names on the front and seal it with a candy cane (assuming I remember to buy candy canes!)

This may be a dumb idea but in case you want to do it, I'll save you some work. pdf versions of the recipe cards and labels below. Enjoy!
(note, some of the labels have most of the ingredients left off since the recipe is so customizable and allergies are so prevalent.)
Download Granola bar label
Download Granola bar recipe
(another note, I was going to add "pages" versions (the apple version of MS word) but the upload tool won't work. I can email them to you if you want. Just ask.

Finally, I'm trying to make this a week of gifty posts so stay tuned, hopefully tomorrow, for a tutorial for a gift for guys.

over and out

Toffee (again)

Success!

This recipe for Brandini Toffee found via Martha Stewart couldn't be yummier or easier.

This was my savior; it looks like a meat thermometer but goes to 450 degrees and won't break into a pan of toffee. $12 at Walmart and well worth the higher price than the glass candy thermometers.

That's it for today's public service announcement.

Now some thank yous!
Neatorama posted a link to my literary clock Instructable
and Ali Edwards posted a link to my felt garland tutorial
Thanks, awesome people! If you're new here from one of those sites, welcome!

Holiday baking is in full swing!

Our wee little Meyer lemon tree gave us our first crop this month and it was a doozy. More than 60 lemons! Go tree! Since it's supposed to get coooold I picked them all yesterday and immediately used six to make this candied lemon peel found via The Small Object.
 
I think I'll serve some at our holiday party--it's quite tasty. Oops, forgot to take a photo of the result, it's also quite pretty.

After than I made Salted Caramel (excellent), granola bars (another success), and then Toffee (disaster!) My cheapo candy thermometer BROKE into my pan of ready-to-pour toffee! I couldn't risk serving glass shards so it all went in the trash. Sob. Well, except for a little taste to confirm that it is excellent and must be remade. Tomorrow. I already bought a new candy thermometer for the occasion.

IndieSac recap

Hi. I'm still here. Sort of.

Between work and holiday prep and a short business trip and a general laziness I haven't been around much so here's what I was going to post last Sunday if I'd had the time.

The show was great. My concern going in was a potential lack of traffic but they had 1000 folks pay to enter and that was plenty for us.

Since I'm always curious how folks really do at craft sales, I'll give you all the dirt. Inquiring minds want to know....

Haworth Woodworks wine stoppers were a hit. There weren't any other woodworkers so his stuff was unique, beautiful and priced right. The 2-for deals meant many customers purchased two. His sale stats:
Silicon stoppers:
3 pairs sold at 2/$25 (6 stoppers, $75)
no single stoppers sold (he only had 7 silicon ones to start with)
Cork stoppers:
4 pairs sold at 2/$20 (8 stoppers, $80)
3 stoppers sold at $12 (3 stoppers, $36)
1 out of 3 cutting boards sold and only at the very last minute ($25)
Total income: $216
Plus he got a few inquiries about custom stuff, had lots of folks view his portfolio and gave away about 25 business cards. AND he got a few more wine stopper orders from co-workers.

Haworth Handmade sales stats:
7 book clocks sold at $15 ($105) plus I "traded" one clock in return for the use of goody-goody's credit card machine (we had $80 worth of credit sales and she processed those for me! Thanks, Lauren)
1 ornament sold for $25 ($25) plus I traded one for some prints from an artist at the show
3 card sets of 5 cards for $5 sold (15 cards, $15)
3 individual cards sold for $1.50 ($4.50) and I traded 2 cards for 3 buttons
2 garlands at $15 ($30)
3 sets of little books at 3/$5 (9 books, $15)
1 little book at $2 ($2)
Total income: $196.50

Since I want to beat Mr. H, I'll assume I sold what I traded and that adds $43. I win!

Expenses: booth fee: $75, lunch: about $15, parking ticket (oops) about $25 (I haven't looked, Mr. H will handle it since he parked the car), cheap wine to display wine cork: about $5.

So, not including the obvious expenses of books and clocks and wine corks etc we made $297.50. I think we definitely came out ahead with a little Christmas spending money.

Here are a few other images from the show (my camera battery ran out). Cool display rack from Blue Bicicleta

Dennis Anderson's soap booth. His Etsy shop has gone WILD since I met him last year at IndieSac. Apparently he quit his day job 6 months ago and is doing great. He can barely keep up with his orders. Way to go, Dennis!

Lauren's always darling booth. This gal knows her branding and packaging! Aren't those dolls darling? A total steal at $40.

The screenprinting booth across the way. I Scream Seams:

 

And then my camera died.

Thanks Amy, Tamie and Lauren for a great sale!

Mr. H's new toy

For a while there whenever I teased that Mr. H had every tool known to humankind he would remind me he didn't own a lathe.

Well:

He's putting it to good use making wine cork stoppers to sell at IndieSacramento. For all you science geeks out there; this one is an Erlenmeyer flask and it's one of a kind.

He's also making a lot of sawdust and a graveyard of broken pieces.

Fortunately, some are working out just fine (these are awaiting their stoppers)

Hope to see you Saturday (I have no idea why everything is underlining!)