In 2007, I used a template I found in a thriftshop to make a bunch of individualized small boxy bags, exactly the size for giftcards. The papers here are very random, some stamped, some punched, some scraps from other projects.
Gift Bags
More Gift Bags
Cute, and fun to make, but not particularly efficient for mailing purposes–best to stick to flat containers for the faraway giftees, I realized too late.
I don’t make my own holiday cards. I did, for years, when I was in grad school–usually with copier images and cut paper. Now I order them from a graphic designer friend–they’re lovely, and it’s a whole lot faster. That leaves me time to make other things for the holidays–so I’ve been crocheting hats for kids, and scarves for snow-dwellers, and ordering photo calendars, and every year I make gift-card holders for the in-law nieces and nephews (all teens and twenty-somethings, this year). The 2006 card holders were cardstock envelopes, heavily collaged, with each kid’s initial incorporated somehow. Here they are, front and back:
There’s an old picture of me and Nell dressed as Hester Prynne and baby Pearl from the Scarlet Letter at the New Yorker‘s Book Bench blog–click through the slideshow of literary Halloween costumes, we’re hard to miss! We won best mother-child costume at our very first MOMS Club meeting in those costumes, in 2000. The dress on Nell was her baptismal gown; the Scarlet Letter on my chest was embroidered by my mother when I was in high school, which tells you how long I’ve been dressing as Hester Prynne, every few years…
It’s Diwali time, so I’ve got a ziplock of lovely Diwali sweets (laddoos) made by my friend’s husband (thanks Srini!). They’re very sweet, crunchy, and taste of ground nuts and cardamom. Mmmmmmmmmm….. In my ideal universe, all sweets would contain cardamom. I can walk past the bowl of Halloween candy without a pang–“nope, nothing with cardamom”–knowing I have a stash of laddoos instead.
Pennamite 