Homemade Gifts for Christmas

You have gotten a ton of fun ideas! I will be using one of them for my x-mas presents. I just wanted to share with you two that we have done, Hot plates and have the kids put there hand print or paint it to there liking. I went to the hardware store and bought a ceramic tile and put felt on the back. Also we have gotten towels, that the family has made ti-died or even painted on. Just a few more ideas! HAve fun with all of this

Make a photo quilt of the kids, and/or the whole family. You can buy the kits at JoAnn Etc. or most craft stores. This online store has them too http://www.travelingdesigns.com/photokits.html.

Kits comes with batting, special photo transferable fabric and paper, etc. www.discountschoolsupply.com has the same thing, but it's called the classroom quilt kit. They cost about $30.

A neat keepsake I made was a photo flower pot. I printed the photos on regular paper (I took them to an office supply store) and attached them using decoupage. I also added a finishing spray. You can add some decorative beads also. Stepping stones are also nice & the kids can add a little token of something that represents them. Family Fun & Kaboose have some nice ideas. Hope you get some great ideas.

T.,

We are making ornaments this year. You can pick up a box of clear, plain ornaments at the craft store. The kids paint them and you can sprinkle them with glitter, too. The look is such that if they even just swirl the paint around, it looks pretty. A ribbon at the top (or even some ribbon and confetti inside) looks nice.

Another option that is popular right not is vinyl lettering on a tile or glass block. There are a million companies on the internet that will do custom lettering. One of my favorites is www.vinylcraftlettering.com Her prices are reasonable and this month, with the code Halloween2008, you get a 20% discount. She has some nice Christmas sayings, or you can request your own or do something related to family or grandparents.

If you aren't familiar with it, you put the lettering where you want it on the tile, rub the letters with a card and gently pull of the paper the letters adhere to. Very easy. The tiles can hang by a ribbon or be displayed on an easel. The glass blocks can sit on a shelf or fireplace mantel with a fabric Christmas ribbon (wired is easier) around it. Glass blocks are actually used to create a privacy window in bathrooms and you can find them at the Home Improvement store for about $6.

Another thing we have enjoyed is making plates. We couldn’t find the non-toxic paint, so we bought clear glass plates and painted the back of the plate so you can see through. Stencils were helpful with this. You could also have them paint hot chocolate mugs and include some gourmet cocoa and marshmallows. Just make sure you get the paint that will resist washing – found at the craft store.

Good luck,
S.

We have made kitchen towels. I buy a 6 pk of white flour cloth towels from Target and we use fabric paint to make either a snowman with their footprint or a reindeer with their footprint and two handprints for antlers. I add the extras myself and they are so cute and useful. Our family members look forward to them every year and can't believe how big their hands and feet are getting.

The last 2 or 3 years, we have made stepping stones with handprints, and footprints (for the Little, little ones).
One year I bought 3 or 4 kits, then saved the mold, and the next year I bought a bag of cement mix and did the same. And then you can also have the children set colored stones or rocks, or other items that might set off their personality next to their name carved it and their handprint.
It's really cool to go to their grandparents house and see the stones set out in their rock gardens, between the flowers. :)
But another idea...my brother just put together a neat DVD off of the computer and a photo program. He took a bunch of fun photos and the computer set it up like a slide show to music. You just download the songs you want with your photos and it sets it up. I think he said he made one that is 35 minutes long.
I saw about 5 minutes of it, and now want to put something together for Christmas myself. :)
Good luck.

Last Christmas, my kids made stepping stones for the grandparents. We put the cement mixture in a disposable tin (although they have kits at craft stores). Each stepping stone had both hand prints in it (one hand from each of my children) and some decorative stones the kids placed on it. When it was dry, I painted each hand print the color of choice (requested by the kids)... this way the hand print 'stood out'. A friend helped me out, so I'm not sure what she used for protecting it from the weather (some type of clear coat). I only wish I would have written the year on it. My daughter spotted the stone at a grandma's we visited recently... she said "This is my hand?" and placed her hand on it :) She is three and still remembers doing this last year.

I look forward to reading other ideas. I love having the kids make things for Christmas. It is more personal (means more) and also helps with the cost too :)

~SR

We've made note pads for the grandparents. THe kids draw pictures and we use the photocopier to shrink their pictures to fit the top of a note pad. (We've made note pads about the size of the ones you buy for grocery lists.) Then, you can take them to an office supply store and they will "gum" the edge for you. The kids like seeing their "art on display" and it is something the grandparents can use and not have to save forever.

I'm enjoying reading the other suggestions. This website is great!

good luck!

I just heard, from a friend, about www.blurb.com where you can make your own coffee table book... I suppose you could make a book of whatever you want, but what my friend did, and what I think I'm going to do for the grandparents for holidays, is to make a book of your child's artwork.

They have set lay-outs, or you can create your own lay-out, and you can determine the length of the book as well. You could make it strictly art or intersperse the art with pictures of the children.

My friend showed me copies of the books she's had made, and they really are well done.

Good luck- it's great to hear everyone's suggestions!

M.

Hi T.,

What about making those cookie recipes in a jar?

Then when your kids are visiting they can make the cookies together? :)

Or maybe a photo box. 8 X 6 X 5" w/lid. Large enough to hold the pictures so they stand up. Have the kids paint it and then your grandparents can put their phots in it.

Have your kids take some pictures of things that are special to them, or take pics of themselves and add those to the top of the photo box.

J.

Check out Heritage Makers! http://www.frommemoriestobook.com You can make completely personalized books and other stuff. I'm making my Grandmas (my kid's Great-Grandmas) personalized playing cards with pictures of the grandkids on them! The quality of their products are WAY better than Snapfish/Shutterfly type products, plus they are more customizable!

T.:

I did not take the time to read thru all of your responses, so if this a repeat, I apologize. What about the tied fleece blankets? I actually made these about 7 years ago for my entire family and they all still have them, in fact I am planning a new set of blankets in a couple of years because some are so worn from being used over and over... It can be a bit costly to do them large enough with two pieces of fleece, but you can also do a lighter weight version with one piece of fleece whereby you cut the fringes and then make a little slice in the middle of each fringe to tuck it thru (looks a little neater)...

what we do almost every year is a personalized calendar from Snapfish - the reason I like them best is because you can put personalized pictures on specific days - i.e. birthdays & Anniversaries. I always use pictures from the year prior so that the grandparents can see how much the boys have changed over the year!
I do like the stepping stone idea that alot of people have posted and think I may use that this year since 2 of the 3 sets of grandparents are big into gardening!

I made patchwork quilts for my mom and mother in law, and then bought the iron on transfers and printed pictures of all of the family and ironed them on. They both cried. Then the next year I made quilt racks for each of them to hang their quilts on the wall behind their beds.

Last year my son made a painted oranment for us. It is really neat. It is a large round glass one, that you can find at Hobby Lobby, that they poured paint into, then tipped it till it covered the way the kids liked. The paint is on the inside, marbled, so it just shines on the tree, I just love it. We plan on making them for the grandparents this year.

HTH,
J.

It's not homemade but my MIL found a site called PersonalizationMall.com. The things on there are really neat. There are all kinds of things that you can have personalized with names. One neat idea that I was thinking about for grandparents was the photoframe that they have. It prints your kids names on the frame itself.

We have also done the photo calendars which were a big hit.

Have you ever done a personalized calendar? If you are crafty enough, you could even do this at home, but Target, Walgreen's, ProEx, just about everybody does them.

It would be a great chance not only to use photos of your kids, but how about pulling out some REALLY embarassing or old photos? Think leisure suits, beehives, 80s hair....

Have fun, and good luck!

We did photo calendars for both my parents last year and they loved it! Check out www.snapfish.com. They have great deals all year round and when you sign up you get 20 free prints! The prices can't be beat and the quality is wonderful. We even do our Christmas cards through them. Good luck to you!

We do photo calendars every year from Costco (costco.com). It's easy to use, and inexpensive. It started out for one Grandma, but soon others requested them and now we do 7! Costco is great because it stores your information (like birthdays, etc.) so you can just insert them the next year without having to re-enter everything.

How about a calendar with pics on it. I am currently making one for my parents and family members. Or make something with their handprints on them. Turn the handprints into angel wings is one idea.

HOw about homemade baking/cooking? A 6 and 9 year old a old enough to do a lot in the kitchen. I have a batch of apple butter on the go today for Christmas gift giving.
Some good ideas for give away gift ideas that would be pretty simple for grade schoolers to help out with are: candied nuts, cookies, biscotti, quick breads, candies/chocolates and premade soup or bar/cookie mixes. I get most of my recipes from allrecipes.com but kaboose.com and familyfun.com have a lot of kid friendly recipes as well as tons of ideas for other homemade gift ideas. I like giving away food b.c a lot of the grandparents, uncles and aunts we have already have everything they need, food is good because they can enjoy it and there's nothing to keep and add to clutter.
K. H.

I used to make photo frames for friends. You can either use an old picture frame, buy a cardboard one at a craft store or even find an inexpensive one somewhere. You want to make sure it has a big frame. Then you cut up pictures and paste them on to the edges. You can use that clear paste that goes of the top (can not think of the name). They are really fun because they are not just ONE picture.

We do photo calendars for the grandparents every year. We've also done tote bags for Mother's Day, etc. I love this site (Discount Photo Gifts): http://www.discountphotogifts.com/

I've used Kinkos/FedEx for calendars too.

I've also had the kids paint flower pots with their own designs and put a flower in there, but I believe that was another Mother's Day present. And we've done the cookie mix in a jar gift before too. Good luck!

How about having the kids bake cookies or make some other goodies for the grandparent. Take lots of photos of the project, everything from picking the receipe to shopping for the ingredients to the mix to baking. Use the photos to put together a small scrap book and/or to decorate the box or tin. Or have the kids decorate the box or tin and include those photos in the scrap book. So - scrapbook, cookies, and decorated tin or box.

Our Daycare made me a wooden tissue box holder when my daughter was an infant. It has her picture on two sides and her foot prints on one side and hand prints on the other. I beleive they said you could buy the wooden box at Ben Franklin's crafts.

You could buy a big flower pot and have the kids put their handprints and names all over it.

T.,

If you go to Snapfish.com, they have a ton of products you can create with a personalized photo. My favorites for Grandparents are the Christmas ornaments. They have several options and they turn out pretty nice, and are less expensive if you purchase multiple of the same thing.

Jessica

Hi T.,
Before I had kids of my own, I used to be a big brothers/big sisters volunteer. For Christmas one year my "little sister" made me a Christmas ornament made from a light bulb.
She painted the light bulb (an incandescent, not cfl) and decorated it. She made mine to look like a snowman.
Thanks for the question, there are lots of great ideas listed from all the moms.
P.

We made magnets last year. We used 1 1/2 inch clear glass gems (they have a flat side) and then we put a photo of each person in our family on a magnet and gave a whole set to each person in our family. I had to buy the glass gems at http://www.wholesalersusainc.com/ because I couldn't find any bigger gems in the stores in the area. I used a clear tacky glue to glue the photo to the gem, and then hot glue to glue the magnet to the photo and gem. They turned out great, and my 3 year old still loves to play with the gems on the fridge and put them in rows, columns, etc.

This year I think we are doing tye die shirts.

Good luck!

For Mothers day I had my 18 month old granddaughter put her hand prints on medium size flower pots and then put thumb and finger prints all over it in red and yellow paint. I made the red ones into lady bugs with a line down the finger print and dots on the side and drew on antanas using a black sharpie marker. For the yellow ones, I made them into bees with drawing stripes and wings. They turned out really cute and it special with my granddaughters hand prints on them. We then planted some flowers in them which you could use a Christmas cactus for it being a Christmas present.

Check out the photo books and photo DVD shows on www.shutterfly.com In the past I have made grandparent gifts with these. I tried to do all pictures of just the kids and kids with those particular grandparents. The DVD shows hold 400 photos, so you could do a lot! Its very user friendly - don't worry...

Last week I found coasters at Big Lots that you could scrapbook some pictures and fun papers in.