Started: December 20, 2007
Finished: December 20, 2007
Made For: myself, my mother, my MIL
Recipe From: the internet
Materials: flour, salt, water, vegetable oil, Mod Podge, ribbon
Tools: Kitchen-Aid stand mixer, ye olde oven, paint brush
Cost: virtually nothing, as i had all the supplies on hand
Would I Do It Again? yes...
Notes / Comments: i have a memory of my Mum making dough ornaments when i was little... a vague memory of candy cane twists and possibly some cookie cutter shapes (wreaths maybe?)... i also remember the inevitable crumbling of said ornaments over the years, after many moves and not-so-delicate handling...
i saw this recipe for baking clay posted on a message board and i thought that i would capture J's hand as a keepsake of his first Christmas... in doing so, i learned a few things...
☆ our kid's hands are huge for a 8½ month old... or, at least, they're bigger than any round shape cutting tool we own...
☆ babies don't like to have their hand squished in dough, unless they can totally annihilate it... to get 6 passable prints, i had to do about 12 tries as he kept messing up the dough on me...
☆ even though the recipe said it would take about 1½ hours to bake, it actually took closer to 3... stupid altitude...
☆ sealing stuff with Mod Podge is time consuming, messy, and will ruin your nice cooling racks... note to self: next time use spray sealant...
☆ the Sharpie you use to write the details on the back of the ornament will bleed into the dough... the end result is homemade and kitschy and that's okay...
Baking Clay Recipe - makes approx. 8 ornaments
1 cup salt
2 cups flour
2 Tbsp vegetable oil
1-1½ cups cold water
preheat oven to 250°... combine dry ingredients, making sure salt is fully incorporated (i used my stand mixer with great results)... slowly add water until you have a soft dough... roll out on a lightly floured surface until between ¼-½ of an inch thick... press child's hand/foot into dough and cut around with a pizza cutter... place on an ungreased baking sheet and bake for 1 hour, or until hard to the touch... flip over and bake for another 30 minutes...
some helpful hints:
☆ you can tint the water with food colouring
☆ you can add glitter to the dough as well
☆ ornaments will swell a little (approx. 5%) as it bakes
☆ if the dough puffs up or swells too much during baking, try adding up to ¼ cup more salt in the next batch...
☆ you can also try dissolving the salt in the water before mixing in order to incorporate it better
☆ these suckers are heavy, so don't make them too big if you want to hang them on your tree
☆ don't over-bake them or seal them too soon... two of my nicest ornaments have since developed cracks in them and i read this was probably due to the dough being too dry... i suspect part of it was having them in the oven so long and sealing them too soon...
January 9, 2008
Hand Print Ornaments
'Tis the Season Scrapbook Page
Started: December 11, 2007
Finished: Work-In-Progress
Made For: J's scrapbook
Scraplifted From: Becky Higgins' Creative Sketches - Volume 2 - pg. 49 (very loosely based on this sketch)
Materials: 3 colours of cardstock, 1 patterned paper, silver eyelets, clear embossing powder, Christmas stickers
Tools: Cuttlebug, Red Tag Sale alphabet cutting die, Spots & Dots embossing folder, SU Christmas Mini stamps, heat embosser, MM Tool Kit, Mini Glue Dots, roller adhesive, Creative Memories Precision Point Adhesive, photo mounts, rotary cutter, silver gel pen
Cost: under $10
Would I Do It Again? no...
Notes / Comments: i did this layout very hastily and really just so i'd have a place to put these random Christmas pictures... i played a little with my Cuttlebug, which is why the red title letters are embossed... in hindsight, it might have been nice to tie in the embossed letters by embossing the red background matting for the photos as well...
the one element i really like about these pages is that i used the tag to label the pictures so i didn't have to journal (i didn't really have much to say)... not only did i get to heat emboss, but i got to set some eyelets... yay for embellishments!
there are two things that bug me, though... i love the patterned paper that i chose, but i don't really think it works with how i arranged it on the page or how i arranged the pictures on top of it... and i was left with the bottom left hand corner empty and i have no idea how to complete it without over-embellishing... Jes at Craft-O-Rama is sending me something that might work (little Christmas light die cuts) and i'm going to try using SU's Crystal Effects on them to tie them in with the stickers... my other thought is printing out J's first letter from Santa and putting it in an envelope there...
January 7, 2008
Christmas Card Workshop
Started: November 4, 2007
Finished: November 4, 2007
Made For: my friends & family
Pattern: provided by the lovely Ms. M
Paper: mostly Stampin' Up
Materials: mostly SU - clear embossing powder, ink pads, various stamps, ribbon, eyelets
Tools: Cuttlebug, heat embosser, various punches
Cost: $30 for 30 cards...
Would I Do It Again? absolutely...
Notes / Comments: this was an all day workshop hosted by a friend of mine, Ms. M, and my first introduction to card making... everything was pre-cut and all i had to do was show up, follow the instructions, do the stamping / embellishment and assemble... i fell in love with the heat embosser and found a way to use it on all of my cards (in my defense, 2 of the cards called for heat embossing as part of the original design by Ms. M)... i also was intrigued by the Cuttlebug enough to eventually buy my own... i've gotten lots of comments about how pretty my cards were this year and i definitely would attend another workshop...
