The Joy of Giving Gifts.

A couple of years ago we decided that as a family, instead of buying gifts we had to make each other something.
We pick names as soon as we open our gifts for the next year, giving each of us a whole year to think, find etc. and make something. Now you may may thinking that's smart, but what really ends up happening is that a couple of weeks before Christmas we scramble to get things done.

Note to self- don't do that this year.


Here are a few of the things we made. (Some will not appear on this blog because they were eaten).

 My daughter Ashley and son-in-law Darryl's church had a yard sale to raise money. All things were donated to the congregation by the congregation.
But this was left behind and was headed for the dumpster.

So they took it home and it became this.

It's for my daughter Amy. Her and her husband Ryan aka Fuzz live in an apartment with little storage so this should help a lot with the floaties that hang around and have no home in their home.

Next up

Amy brought home a bunch of these from work. Combining their efforts Roger and Fuzz took them apart and made this.

It doesn't have a finish on it yet because we wanted to ask Ashley and Darryl what they wanted first. It will be on their new deck this year and they decided just to seal it. They like the different colours of the boards. We really like the way it turned out and I think we may make a few more of these. The pallets are free and who doesn't like free!

Some of these were made for M'lynn

and this

Grapefruit smelling bath salts and lip balm and we also made a mint chocolate one.

Amy took some of Isaac's lego people and made this for him.

And I got these funky comfy pants from Ashley. Believe me when I say comfy. I think I wore them for most of the Christmas holiday's. I even washed them late one night, popped them in the dryer the next morning just so I could wear them that day.

The things we ate were homemade chocolates. We had peppermint patties, Oreo cookie bark, mint chocolate bark, and peanut butter cups. They were tasty. (The boys who got them were nice enough to share)

It's all fun stuff and I like the fact you won't find it in a store. And if your looking for ideas to make stuff for this year. Pinterest is a great place to start.

Wishing you all a Happy New Year! :)