Cute gifts for under 50 cents?!?

Every year my gift list seems to grow.  Teachers, friends, neighbors, co-workers, mailman, the lady I wave to that walks her dog every day!  I love giving gifts, it's my love language, but my income doesn't necessarily match my desire for lavish gift-giving!  :0)  So I plan ahead and do what I can, hit after Christmas sales, shop year round, and now scour pinterest for cute, cheap, gift ideas to show people I care without going into debt.  Here is an idea I saw in a magazine years ago that I am using for some of those on my gift list this year.  (Hopefully none of them see this before I give them out)   When I averaged out the cost, it came to about 45 cents a piece.

Here are the materials you will need:

Clear or pearl-like ornaments

White or colored paper shred

Your choice of ribbon

Letter stickers

Here is a closer shot of the letter stickers I chose, this was after I made them so some letters are missing.  I loved the black against the white shred.

Directions are simple.  Stuff the shred into the ornament, stick on the letter and tie with a ribbon for hanging.  Easy and cute!

And where to I keep all these ornaments until I give them out??

On a cupcake stand of course!  :0)

Happy gifting!!

Let Me Count the Ways

I made this little project last year for my husband for Valentine's Day.  I was looking in the scrapbook section at Tuesday Morning and this jumped out at me.

Of course it didn't have paint on it and this is the back of it but you get the idea.

So I snatched it up for 99 cents and came home and went to work.

I need to say right now how much I LOVE craft paint. Less than a buck a bottle and you can paint just about anything with that stuff. 

So I grabbed some Valentinesy colors and some stickers left from my kid's Valentine's and tried to make it cute.

This is what I came up with.

A list of reasons why I love my husband. 

Sometimes we can get so caught up in what annoys us or what we wish we could change that we need to remind ourselves of all the wonderful reasons they are number one in our lives.

After painting each "page" and letting dry, which I have no patience and that is why the backs are not painted.

 I added the writing and stickers, then some cute ribbon to finish it off.

Before I wrote on it I brainstormed on paper any and everything I could come up, even things that might sound silly or special inside jokes.  It's truly the little things that make a relationship special. 

The color is a little off on this pic because I tried to edit it to blur the words. 

Some things don't need to be on the internet! ;)

So there is an inexpensive, thoughtful little something you can give your spouse this Valentine's Day.  And who says it has to be painted and covered in stickers?  I'm sure he would love it just as much scribbled on a post-it!



This post is linked up to Sunday Showcase Party here - check it out!

Sending out some treats

I realize it is after Christmas and I am only now posting about this BUT  I find some of these things at garage sales during the summer so better late than never right?  Anyway, here are some of the goodies our friends and neighbors received from us this year.

I think how you wrap a gift is almost as cool as the gift itself.  The candy striped box held some great Pampermint foot stuff from Arbonne....yummy!!  The candle was purchased in a set at Sam's early in the season which made them $5 a piece!  Add a tag and 1/2 price ornament from Hobby Lobby and you're good to go!

 I got this cutie container at a garage sale for like 50 cents.  I'm telling you, I find Christmas containers like this all through the summer and I have a tub I keep in my garage where I put them all until I need them.  They always come in handy, especially if you need a quick gift.  Throw in some cookies or fudge and you're set!  Plus they cost practically nothing.

 Tins from Target Dollar Spot - can't beat it!

I should mention I added the words to these on my own.

 So I tried chocolate dipped pretzels this year.  They were so easy and kinda fun to make.  I chopped up some walnuts, candy canes and used some festive sprinkles as well. 

Well there you have it, some cute ideas that say Merry Christmas without costing you a fortune!

Bye Bye Boring Calendar....

Hello Shutterfly book!! 
Every year I get my dad a photo calendar for Christmas.  Ya know, twelve months, twelve pictures taken throughout the year.  Inevitably I wouldn't remember this little project until November or so, leaving me to search through the pictures for the best twelve I could find only to question myself on every month.  Well no more!!  I got an email link from a friend of mine sending me to this little website to make a FREE book. 
Now my first thought was wondering how cool a free book could possibly be but let me tell you....I'm ecstatic!  I love when I find things that make my life easier.  I'm sure some of you have known about these little book treasures for a while but I'm obviously behind the curve.  It took me about an hour and a half to make.  Click, drag, label.   That's it people!  No cutting, no adhesive, no borders, backgrounds or stickers to stress me out.  (Can you tell I'm a recovering scrapbook perfectionist?)
Well, I got my glorious little book in the mail today and I cannot WAIT for my dad to open it.  I have to say it was tempting to keep for myself.  But I figure I can make more...and more....this could truly give my children hope that someday they will be able to flip through an actual book with pictures of their lives instead of dumping out a box of pictures to sort through. 
I ♥ you Shutterfly!  Thank you for giving me a fun orange envelope to open and squeal with delight when I see my masterpiece!!

Back to School Surprise

I saw these on a blog and thought they were too cute and wanted to make my own.  This year is weird because I really only have one teacher to buy for.  If I made Sydni haul these to her jr. high teachers she would kill me, so one it is.

I decided to hot glue the ribbon and flower on so she could keep it there all the time.  I bought a package of those big pink flowers at a scrapbook store a while back and have used them on tons of things.  Tote bags, clipboards and binders (and of course this).  The tag is just a post-it note.  I filled it with push pins, band-aids, hand sanitizer, lip balm, paper clips (big and small), tab post-its, erasers, candy, hair bands, safety pins, cough drops and award stickers.  I was happy with it.  The only tough part was coming up with stuff that would fit in those little compartments!  Happy Back-to-School!!

Teacher Gifts Pt. 2

Well because I posted the first one as part 1, I felt I had to make a part 2 even though I wasn't super excited with what I did this year.  I just plain ran out of time, energy, and creativity.  The end of the year caught up with me and having to plan four major events for my daughter's 6th grade class just took precedence.  I will post about that soon.  ANYWAY, I made these yummy peanut butter chocolate bars...you can find the recipe here.  I put them on these adorable little plates I found at, where else, Target, and wrapped them up all cute with some ribbon.  I also added a Target gift card in their card so they could pick out what they like.

Naturally I had to taste test these babies and they were delish!  So give them a try.  You could even wrap them up all cute and give them to yourself as a gift - just be sure and hide them from the rest of the fam! ;)

Teacher Gifts Pt. 1

I'm not sure how they do it in your neck of the woods but around here, you send a gift to your child's teacher at least Christmas and the end of the year.  If you're really on the ball you do Halloween, Valentine's Day and Teacher Appreciation Week.  That being said, I have been brainstorming what I would like to do this year for my kid's teachers.  I really like to hand make them something but that usually depends on my time and sanity!  :)  Here are a couple ideas I have done in the past that I thought were fun!

These are some mini clipboards I made that were super easy.  I bought some cute scrap paper and used Modge Podge to put it on the front.  I then sealed it with some craft sealant and added some ribbon.  It can get tricky smoothing out the wrinkles sometimes.  I used a smoothing tool that you use for spackle. (I don't know what they are actually called)  I also attached a green little flower in the bottom corner for some depth but it's hard to tell in the picture.

I bought these cute pink buckets in Target's Dollar Spot and cut out each teacher's initial from scrap paper and again used Modge Podge to seal it on the bucket.  Then I filled them with homemade goodies.  These were really fast to make.

These monogrammed bags were a little more time consuming.  I have done these a couple years now and the material I buy is based on the bag I find first.  These had the light green handle so I decided to go with a green and gold fabric.  However one year I found some with black handles and did black and white polka dot fabric and outlined in lime green and they were way cute!!   So you print off the initial on paper from your computer using 600 font.  Then cut it out and attach it to your material using straight pins.  Now if you can sew then you could just sew the letter on the bag but I unfortunately do not so I used fusible web to attach the letter then outlined it in corresponding puff paint.  I attached a tag onto the handle using a strip of the fabric for the ribbon.

All these are fairly cheap and simple.  And there are more to come so stay tuned!  Oh, and I would love to hear your ideas!!