Present tags out of Christmas cards

Christmas cards! I love to give and get Christmas cards. The holiday season is always so busy and trying to see all of my family and friends can be difficult. I want them to know that our family is wishing them a wonderful holiday and a happy new year even if we were not able to get together and celebrate. 

Christmas comes and goes and your left with a stack of cards from family and friends. What do you do with yours? Well I used to save each and every one in a box! I always enjoyed looking back at them the next Christmas but thought to myself "do I really need to save these?" I am always trying to re-purpose things and as I was flipping through past cards I thought some of them would make cute tags. So for a few years now that is what I have been doing with my Christmas cards. 

First I read each one over again! I mark off who I received cards from in my Christmas planner, and then I pick out the card that I think will make a cute tag.

I then get out my tools that I will need. My Fiskars paper cutter, and my favorite punches. 

I then trim off the parts of the cards I will not need. 

I then take my punches and punch out the area in circles, scalloped circles, scalloped squares or I just use my corner round punch to round up the corners. And wa-la I now have tags for my presents next year. 

All you need to do now is use a hole punch, string some ribbon through it, and fill out your to and from on the back. Some tips for you to remember; check the back of the area you want to punch as some cards have writing or another picture there and you will not be able to write your to and from, don't forget to look at those photo cards - I trim out the picture for a photo album but use the images for tags, look for images inside the card and on the back of the card too - sometimes they will work for a tag, and finally don't attempt the cards that have a paper lining inside - they are glued in there and don't come apart nicely leaving you with a messy back to your tag.

Merry Christmas!

Just a quick post to say Merry Christmas to you and your family! We are having a wonderful Christmas! Santa was very good to our boys and I have a feeling that I will not see my boys for days with all the Lego's they got! Their fingers will be hurting by the time they are done building! We had candy canes for breakfast.....the healthy ones :) So easy to make and the boys loved it. Just cut up strawberries and bananas in slices and arrange in the shape of a candy cane! 

Snow Much Fun

Today the boys and I made snowman pillows, an idea I found on Pinterest. The idea was not linked for me to give credit as it was just a picture. I knew they would love them so I headed out to the stores to get the supplies. I had to guess a little as there was no supply list or instructions. This was a super cheap project! I got the pillows for $5.58 each, a set of two pillow cases for 3.58 the Santa hats for $2.99 each, I had the ribbon, and I had the foam for the eyes, nose, and buttons. So each pillow cost about $10.00. 

I had the kids put the pillow case on their pillow. Then they held the pillow up while I tied the ribbon, and their little finger helped me to double knot it! I also tied up the top of the pillow to make it look more rounded like a snowman. I used the foam sheets that have a sticky side on the back. I cut out the eyes, nose and buttons and the kids peeled the paper off and stuck them on. Lastly I safety pinned the hats on. The kids had fun and so did Mommy too!

One Word

My one word for 2012 was change. Well I guess you can say that was a perfect word for me. The biggest change for me was our address. We moved this year to a beautiful new home. In my previous post about my one word for 2012 I can say I continued to carry a 4.0 GPA, I did make more time for me (as much as I could), I learned to say no (that was big for me as I was always saying yes to everything and everyone). There are so many things that I changed in my life this year but I still have more to change. 

Now as 2013 is just around the corner I am starting to think about my one word for 2013. Reflecting back on what the purpose of the one word challenge is. One word that sums up who you want to be or how you want to live or what you want to achieve by the end of 2012. I am now asking myself what the word is for the answer to that sentence for 2013. What is your word for 2013??

The Elf on the Shelf

Do you have an elf?? This is our third year with our elf Roddie. The kids love him and become angels when Roddie shows up. Chores get done with out asking, dinners get finished, the talking back stops, it's great! We have found our elf in some fun place in the morning and thanks to Pinterest I think Roddie will have even better spots! Thought I would share with you some of Roddie's places we have found him over the past three years.

Roddie hanging out in my pots and pans.

 

Roddie wanted to help me decorate

 

Roddie need a nice relaxing bubble bath!

We have so much fun with Roddie. It is a holiday tradition for our family. When does your elf show up? Ours shows up right around Thanksgiving or right after. Has your elf forgotten to move? Ours has but we just assumed that was a spot he liked and wanted to stay there one more day. Has your elf ever been touched? What did you say or do? Nathan touched Roddie one year and I knew right away as I found him on the floor and not in his spot. I asked Nathan if he touched him and he started to cry and said yes. So I left Roddie there for 2 days! We then wrote Santa a letter about how sorry Nathan was for touching Roddie and can he please give Roddie his magic back......it worked! The next day Roddie was in a new spot! What are some creative spots your elf has landed in? I would love to hear all your stories and ideas!

Hangers

I have been starting small on the organizing project in my new home. I would love to dive right in to so many projects but I am trying not to overwhelm myself. Besides the holidays are right around the corner and I am in a pretty tough class for school so my time is limited.

We finally have a nice walk in closet so of course I would like it to be neat and organize! However this is what it looks like with all our miss-matching plastic hangers.

I am in love with the slim line hangers!! I bought a box of 35 for $10.00 at Costco and tried them out. At first they were a little bit of a pain because they have a felt fabric around the hanger and it really grabs the clothes but it's a plus on my tank top style shirts! No more need for hangers with the indent or slots to place those spaghetti straps! You have to adjust the clothes a bit to have them hang right on the hanger, but wow what a difference! 

I have converted almost all of the closet over. I have to grab a few more boxes to finish the rest this week! They really do maximize the space and I love that all the hangers are the same color! I organize my clothes by color, as you can see, but I also organize by sleeve length. Spaghetti strap tank tops first, then thicker tank top straps, short sleeves, 3/4 length sleeves, long sleeves, and finally sweat shirts or fleeces. I have mostly black clothes (what women doesn't) then my colors run white, brown, red, yellow, green, blue, purple, pink, and grey. I hang all my jeans and pants and again by color and length (pants, or capris). I also have a section for sweats. I am a stay-at-home mom so I have lots of sweats! So I organize the sweat outfits by color as well.

How do you organize your clothes? 

Were in! Let's get organizing!

Wow that 19 days went fast since my last post! We have been in our new home for a week now.....swimming in boxes trying to find a spot for everything but we love our new home. I can't wait to organize it and show you what I have done. First spot (because it's the easiest and I need to start small) my mud room. Any suggestions as to what I should decorate the cubbies up top with? I have bins for the 5 cubbies below for the shoes, and two smaller bins for a cubbie up top to hold keys and sunglasses. Am I missing anything? Coats, backpacks, shoes, keys, sunglasses????