Vanilla for Christmas

This year I made vanilla for Christmas gifts. Since vanilla is super easy to make (just putting vanilla bean and vodka in a bottle), the packaging took the most time (and truthfully, I didn’t spend that much time doing it either). I kept it pretty simple. I just made a tag that said the ingredients and when it was bottled. And a label that said what it was—vanilla. I have yet to try it…so I hope it tastes okay.

DIY: Travel Sewing Kit

I decided to make sewing kits as Christmas presents this past year. I wanted to reuse Altoids tins I had for a small travel case.

SUPPLIES Exterior

• Cotton fabric
• Felt fabric
• Steam-to-Steam
• 3/8 inch ribbon
• Scissors
• Glue
• Iron and ironing board
• Altoids tin

DIRECTIONS

— 1 —
Cut a piece of felt that is the dimensions of the Altoids tin’s top. This should be about 3.75 inch length by 2.375 inch width. Round the corners to match.

— 2 —
Cut a piece of fabric that’s about an inch longer in length and width to the Altoids tin’s top—about 4.75 inch by 3.375 inch.

— 3 —
Cut a piece of Steam-to-Steam that is about 0.25 inch longer in length and width to the Altoids tins top—about 4 inch by 2.625 inch.

— 4 —
Using the directions of the Steam-to-Steam, adhere the felt piece to the wrong side of the fabric.

— 5 —
Cut the corners of the fabric.

— 6 —
Add glue to the fabric. Carefully fold over each fabric side to the felt. Add extra glue if necessary. Press gently. Let dry.

— 7 —
Add glue to top of Altoids tin. Adhere the fabric felt piece on top. Let dry.

— 8 —
Add glue around the outside of the tin lid.

— 9 —
Carefully place ribbon along the side of the tin lid (to cover where the fabric felt piece and the tin meet). Cut the ribbon when the ribbon overlaps. Add a little bit of glue to the overlapping ribbon. Let dry. Travel Sewing Tin complete.

To fill the tin with sewing supplies, I bought sewing supplies and divided them among the number of kits I was creating. This is for one kit.

SUPPLIES Interior

• 4 needles (different sizes)
• 4 pins
• 4 buttons (different sizes and colors)
• 2 safety pins (different sizes)
• Travel scissors
• Thread (I used five colors: white, black, red, navy and gray)

• Chipboard (Could use the back of the drawing pad, or food box packaging like cereal)
• Scissors
• Pencil
• Ruler
• Felt fabric 

— 1 —
Cut out of piece of chipboard that is 1.75 x 3 inch. On the long side, measure and mark at every 0.5 inch (there should be a total of 5 marks). Repeat on other side.

— 2 —
With scissors, cut little triangles out at each mark. I eyeballed this—they triangles are about 0.125 inch deep.

— 3 —
In the middle of the chipboard short end, cut about .0375 inch deep with scissors. Repeat on the other short end.

— 4 —
Wrap the thread around the chipboard, catching the thread between two triangle notches. I wrapped my thread around the chipboard about thirty times.

— 5 —
Then take the thread and put it through the slit on the short end of the chipboard. Cut thread. Repeat this process for the other thread colors.

Note: On the two bottom threads, I used the bottom slit to put the thread through.

— 6 —
Cut two pieces of felt fabric about 1.75 inch by 2.5 inch.

— 7 —
On the first piece of felt, slide four needles though.

— 8 —
On the second piece of felt, slid four pins through.

— 9 —
Put all components of the sewing kit inside the tin. Travel Sewing Kit complete.

Celebrate with Crap

Does anyone ever want a stuffed bear holding a heart? Does anyone ever want a Santa mug? I’m guessing for a vast majority of us, it’s a resounding “No.” Most of us don’t need more stuff that will just sit around accumulating dust—especially seasonal junk. Yet holidays in particular seem to be overwhelmed with junk you can get your friends, family and significant other. [Pause.] It’s depressing.

This is the type of “gift” that people open, take a deep breath in to give themselves a moment to think and then say in a falsely happy voice, “Oh! You shouldn’t have!” And think to themselves, “Seriously. You shouldn’t have. What am I going to do with this?” [Pause.] “It’s going to Goodwill.”

Ideally, the purpose of giving a gift is to give something that the other person will like, not just giving a gift for the sake of giving a gift. But I suppose people often give obligatory gifts, and that’s where these crappy presents come into play. It’s the most selfish of gifts to give because you’re not thinking of the other person at all. You’re not taking into consideration their likes and interests, you’re just picking the easy thing that’s right in front of you at the department store or supermarket or convenience store. It’s lazy. And wasteful if the present isn’t used.

No one is really excited about giving or getting a one of these mass-produced and utterly unnecessary items as presents. So don’t waste your money on crap that will go unappreciated because it’s not worth being appreciated. It’s supposed to be the thought that counts…although you wouldn’t know it from all the crap out there.