I am trying to make a conscious effort to buy (or make!) handmade gifts for the holidays. I suppose there goes the idea of buying my Mom new dishes - maybe she can be the exception! Then again I could always look for someone who makes dishes…

There is a huge craft fair in our area in November and the beginning of December where I bought a few gifts last year. The local grocery store had coupons for a dollar off the entrance fee and I grabbed up a couple of them already. The fair is in our local coliseum and it is covered from inch to inch in booths - can you imagine the crafty goodness? Some things people were even creating in their booths - I love watching the process. We didn’t get to walk around the entire area last year as it was too big and I had the kids with me.

Check out BuyHandmade.org and pledge to buy handmade this holiday season. I’m taking a second look at my gift list now. A few things I’ve already planned to make and it’s just a couple of my nephews I need to think about. I’m sure I can find something boys would like! Oh and when I found this site earlier this week they were at about 280 people pledging, as of this post they are just over 1400!

The Halloween crafts, ideas, recipes and costumes are coming out of my ears. Seriously, I’ve never seen this many but then again I’ve never looked around like I have either.

My Paper Crane shared cat and pumpkin images - she made them initially for suckers but others turned them into a sort of banner. We had the neighbors over yesterday and made a few different things.

Here are Alice’s cut outs ~

She cut out two more sheets worth, having 18 total, and strung them together top to bottom. She did stick with the pumpkin/cat/pumpkin/cat pattern and attached them to each other with pink and blue brads. She’s very much into patterns and alternated the colors pink/blue/pink/blue. She was very happy with herself for sticking with it! I’d have a picture but it has disappeared to the abyss that is her room (I swear I didn’t think kids rooms could be that messy!).

But one of the neighbor girls made the same kind of top to bottom stringing, and her Mom attached the younger girls into a wreath. The kids all lasted cutting them out and then they were done. Course they had already cut out and put together a skeleton.

The skeleton is awesome - you can find it here at the Sewing Stars blog. We made four or five of them and they quickly were traded back and forth, then attached to the banners that were made. I’m going to hang the banner up tomorrow and have the kids make a few more skeletons and hang them in the window! I’m proud of us for doing these crafts, we usually don’t decorate for Halloween other then a few stuffed pumpkins we’ve had since Alice was a few months old.

I printed all of the things at home and did have to adjust my printing - the margins and the size of the file. My printing option (or maybe it’s my printer?) lets you adjust the image by 10% at a time. It was very easy though.

Technorati Tags: My Paper Crane, cat and pumpkin images, Sewing Stars blog, halloween crafts

So I had this idea - I’m going to go through all the pictures saved of my nephews when they were babies (I’m thinking of the two 8 year olds) and print them out. I probably won’t print all of them but just the ‘good’ ones and I’ll stick them in an album for Christmas. One nephew doesn’t have any pictures of himself as a baby and the other does, but these are pictures I took, and no one but the hard drive ghosts have seen them.

Then I found this ~ Blurb ~ from abby try again (she has a book ordered and they give you a preview link, check hers out if you are interested!). You can upload from Flickr (hhmm, I have a professional account, I can just upload all of my pictures of said nephews) and add text or whatnot from there. And the prices are definitely reasonable - considering I wouldn’t have to spend the time printing, yeah definitely reasonable.

These would be Christmas gifts and would you believe I already have five of seven done or bought for my nephews? Okay I counted two as ideas for these picture books, but that is a pretty good start considering it isn’t even Halloween yet.

Oh! And I could do a picture book of our old house! And one of here, someday. And the vacations we’ve been on. The possibilities!

I should just sell my photo printer, I’ve used it so few times (seriously, I’ve printed maybe six pictures). That’s just not right.

We went to a Barbie Island Princess birthday party today - it was so cute! I’ve never ordered any set for a birthday party and my neighbor found a pin the crown on the princess game, well it was a stick the crown since it used stickers. They also had a couple of craft kits to make necklaces and bracelets, everyone had a lot of fun with that.

The little girl loves the Disney Princesses so we found a purse and lip gloss pack for her. I figure all little girls that age (the same as Alice) like makeup and sure enough we were right on the money. All the kids had a good time. And since it was so girly, Chris took Jake and had a Daddy/Son day - they played miniature golf and ran to the grocery store to buy some treats.

Alice isn’t into Barbie yet, not really anyway. She likes the Groovy Girls (my personal favorite!) and plays dress up, plays with blocks and cars with Jake and isn’t really attached to any one thing. I hope that continues, I don’t know how to handle an obsession it seems some kids have with Barbie or other dolls.

So we have Barbie as The Island Princess and Groovy Girls - I suppose it is kind of even.

Oh and Alice drew a picture on the top part of the card for the little girl, when she opened the card she said “Oh wow Alice, I didn’t know you could draw so good!” Little kids are so funny.

I’ve been thinking about tattoos a lot lately. I think this has happened before but I can’t pinpoint when. It started a couple of months ago, and I can’t draw at all so all of my ideas are in my head. I think of the snake my Uncle has, but doesn’t talk about, and the partial initials my Dad has (he did it himself, in a class in school), and the elaborate sleeves a friend of ours has. I watch shows like Miami Ink and LA Ink and think of driving there to get a tattoo done by one of them.

I have a short stack of journals/notebooks (all designated to certain topics of course) and on top are a few blank moleskines - I need to just get a pencil and start sketching. Of course it won’t be perfect, but it’s not about perfection. It’s about expression and art and the love of whatever you are drawing.

I’m browsing craft blogs and came across an article at The Storque on Etsy about home made tattoos (really reminds me of my Dad’s initials on his hand). I have new colored pencils and a moleskine, I just need to do it. At least it will be a start.

I saved the picture after browsing tattoo art online - if it is yours please let me know and I’ll link it! I saved it because I like the bird, I’ve been attracted to sparrows lately.

Today, Oct. 15, 2007, is Blog Action Day - 15,000 bloggers writing about the environment.

All of my life I’ve taken care to take care of the environment. As kids we always cleaned up our street (others weren’t as nice as us about not throwing trash out), sometimes Mom had to talk us into it, sometimes not. Although my brothers and I didn’t start recycleing until we were older, adults living on our own, it’s something we continue to do (I’m always amazed at how much paper we throw out). We changed our lightbulbs to the curly looking ones, the CFLs, turn off lights when we aren’t in the room, wash clothes when there is only a full load and the same with dishes, run errands all in one shot and more.

The high school I attended does a earth week, when most others are celebrating earth day. It was always fun, I was never one to skip a day or two like others did. There was a wide variety of events to sign up for from reporting on the events, cleaning up areas of town, painting, planting, etc.

Crafting is another story - I only halfway use things I have around the house. I have a stock of crafting items but when I go to make something I sometimes realize I don’t have one thing around the house to finish it. Frustrating for me and doesn’t go with the whole use what you have thinking. I am working on being better when it comes to crafting.

Whip Up has a great article written for today, check it out here.

I admit it, some days I just want to go around answering meme’s.

My friend Marie tagged me for a 7 things about me that you may not know meme.

1. I love organizing - not necessarily using my things once they are organized, but just the act of organizing. I love it even more if my Mom is around to help.

2. I love shopping, window shopping and online shopping. I can go to stores and just walk around, walking out with nothing (okay that is rare). I want to go downtown at least once before we go and just walk around looking at the stores. Online is even better, you can leave windows open and go back and pick up where you left off!

3. I don’t like doing the ‘man jobs’ around the house - you know, taking out the trash, mowing the lawn, etc. My brothers did that stuff when I was growing up and I think Chris should do them now (sometimes he doesn’t agree with that, but that’s neither here nor there).

4. We bought a new bed a week ago and I’m not sure if I like it - for sleeping. For laying around during the day it is awesome, I have the laptop, a book, plenty of space to lounge around and a nightstand for my water. What, I have kids to take care of? Oh yeah…

5. I love to read - wait, maybe that is already known? I have a lot of books and finally found a bookstore that is a trade in store, can’t wait to go there!

6. I procrastinate, big time. I have a lot I need or want to do but a lot of it is put on the backburner, often for no good reason! It’s a bad habit and I’m working on changing that.

7. I like folding clothes. There I said it, it’s true. Moving them to the washer and dryer, not so fun.

I tag Tishia Lee, Much More Than A Mom and Carrie Lauth.