Handmade Inspiration

• Add a little red and white to a T shirt or hat for a baby or child.  Or adult, frankly, because I can see a lot of potential in this combination of leaf shapes and simple embroidery.

• Easy, bold, modern tree ornaments.

• Martha Stewart.com has a six-week Christmas Workshop.  Like so many other sites, it’s great that they’re breaking ideas down into categories like ‘gifts for him’ and ‘gifts for kids’.

• And while we’re on the topic: the Martha Stewart “Holiday” magazine. It’s inspiring me to such a degree that I’m practically floating.  It may just be the best $8 Canadian I’ve ever spent on crafting.  Seriously.  The projects are super simple, infinitely adaptable, and cover just about everything that you’ll need: crafts, tasty goodies, gifts, decorating, cards, wrapping…  Craft Leftovers has a good review of it up, and is, in fact, the reason I picked it up at the store.  I’m particularly attracted by the knotted braclets (could they be a better mix of simplicity and gorgousness?) and the paper ornaments (cheap yet fabulous), not to mention the cinnamon bird ornaments (could they have nailed the bird trend any better?).  The recipes have got some great-for-guys gifts, too – I’m thinking particularly of the flavoured alcohols. I can see myself crafting out of this magazine for the whole year.

• We all know that guys can be harder to buy gifts for and even harder to make gifts for, so here’s an idea that’s floating round my brain: I’m totally inspired by the idea of these two fabric boxes: simple patchwork fabric box and an undercover crate.  Use the right fabrics, and even think about freezer paper stenciling on a picture of gear that matches his hobby, and make a place for his bike helmet, or camera gear, or Wii controllers, for instance.

As always, these will be added to the holiday gift master list.