Grandma Stories» christmas holiday

Handmade Christmas Decorations – Indoor Christmas Decorations to Make

Grandma — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 19:21:01 +0000

Making handmade Christmas decorations, Christmas tree ornaments, diningroom table and fireplace mantel xmas home decor is just one of the many reasons why I’m anxious to receive my new sewing machine for Christmas this year. Christmas is my all-time favorite holiday, not because of all the festive Christmas gift-giving or receiving gifts that goes with the holiday season, but because of what Christmas means to me personally.

To me, Christmas means spending time with those you love and who love you, remembering that Christmas is all about Jesus and all He did for us, not about Christmas presents. Christmas is a time of sharing and being with family and close friends, helping those in need who are less fortunate than ourselves, like people living in shelters or homeless people living on the street or those who don’t have enough food to eat. You don’t have to be a Church-going attendee to understand the true meaning of Christmas.

Decorating for Christmas, indoor and outdoor, can get very expensive. I’m not really interested in decorating every room in the house for Christmas, but I’ve gotten quite a few great ideas on ways to decorate for Christmas from online pictures and sewing patterns of things I can make myself, at a much cheaper price than simply buying decorations at retail or online stores. As a self-proclaimed sewing beginner, finding simple, quick and easy craft projects that I can make with my sewing machine or by hand, gives me so many Christmas decorating ideas that I don’t know where to begin.

I’ve made my own Christmas wreaths before and the wreaths turned out quite nicely, so much so that I’ve been asked a few times to make Christmas wreaths for others, and I was happy to oblige. A few years ago I was asked to make several wreaths of varying kinds and styles that would be sold at a church craft sale and the proceeds donated to charity, and I fully intend on making and selling other Christmas decorations and crafts where the profit proceeds are once again donated to charities.

I enjoy handmade and commercial Christmas decorations and ornaments of all kinds just like everyone else does. Angels, gingerbread houses, snowmen, reindeer, Santa’s and elves, they’re all beautiful and unique in different ways. Indoor and outdoor animated Christmas decorations make us laugh and smile, but I have no lofty plans of making animated decorations or wooden outdoor Christmas yard art whatsoever. I’ll leave the animated stuff and lawn décor to the skilled and experienced professionals.

To make Christmas decorations that are homemade, made by hand or with my sewing machine, will be a long-term project of making a variety of crafts to display throughout the Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday season at home, to give as inexpensive gifts or to adorn Christmas presents with homemade Christmas tree ornaments rather than using typical cheap ribbons and bows sold in stores.

I become a kid-at-heart during the Christmas holiday season, especially during our annual visit to a relatively expensive Christmas decoration store where I get some great ideas for decorating at Christmastime without actually buying much of anything at the very high-priced store. Virtually everything sold at the local Christmas décor store is handmade, including artificial Christmas trees, ornaments, stockings, tree skirts, countdown calendars, garland, home decorations, tablecloths, wreaths etc, but buying unique handmade Christmas decorations there comes at a very high cost that will drain your wallet dry rather quickly.

With my adoration for reindeer and snowman Christmas decorations being at the top of my list of craft projects to start making, besides the usual Santa’s and elves and sleighs of course, decorating the front door, fireplace mantel, kitchen, bathroom, living room and dining room areas for the Christmas season is going to be a lot of fun. It will also give me plenty of time and opportunity to greatly improve my sewing and crafting skills in order to feel competent and good enough to sell (or give as gifts) the homemade Christmas decorations I decide to make.

I’ll of course be watching closely for after-Christmas sales, discounts and clearances on exterior Christmas decorations to save for next year’s lawn displays. Finding unique and inexpensive blow up outdoor decorations shouldn’t be too hard, except at retail stores that have already been picked over and the only yard art left is stuff no one else wants either. I have no intention of turning the inside or outside of our house into a Santa’s village or “winter wonderland” at all, but it will be a lot of fun to at least have a few rooms decorated nicely for Christmas parties and family gatherings and not look so primitive and bare.

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Bad Gift Emporium – When It’s The Thought That Counts is Bad Gifts

Grandma — Sat, 26 Dec 2009 15:58:32 +0000

Heard of the Bad Gift Emporium? The Bad Gift Emporium is a site dedicated to re-gifting a gift received that are unwanted gifts. Bad Gift Emporium is the online version of people standing in those long return lines and gift exchange lines at stores to return bad gifts, since the belief of it’s the thought that counts is just a lie.

A bad gift may be both radiant or repulsive to the gift recipient, depending on the eye of the beholder. If you’ve ever stood in the gift returns line to return or exchange a bad gift, or a White Elephant gift you don’t want, check out Bad Gift Emporium at badgiftemporium.com

The day after Christmas is always a popular day for people to go to Bad Gift Emporium, which makes the bad gift site show up on the list of trending topics at Google Trends. Remember, it’s the thought that counts…..right? Wrong.

If you received a few gifts that you don’t want or don’t like, Bad Gift Emporium is the site of the day to explore, trade or compare your own bad gifts collection with the gifts that have been submitted.

Remember the old saying “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure”? That’s one reason why Bad Gifts Emporium is so popular right after Christmas. No driving to the store and standing in those long lines to return bad gifts anymore. Just head over to the bad gifts official website and turn in your bad gifts or unwanted gifts for someone else to enjoy.

At Bad Gift Emporium, people upload photos of bad gifts they received with hope that some visitor will see it and want to take their gift off their hands. Some people may have to keep their bad gifts, especially if they live with the bad gift-giver, so those people just share photos of the bad gifts they have to keep and put up with for a verrrry long time.

If nothing else, checking out the Bad Gift Emporium website can be a fun and entertaining site to visit just to see what sort of things people consider to be a bad gift. Plus, it further proves the point that it’s the thought that counts is just a bunch of bull.

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It’s The Thought That Counts Means What Exactly?

Grandma — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 01:55:48 +0000

I’ve heard the phrase “it’s the thought that counts” in regards to gift giving for so many years, you might think I actually buy into what that rather famous quote means. But I’m not sure I really believe that it’s the thought that counts rather than the price tag and quantity of gifts given at Christmastime or Birthdays or any other special occasion or holiday.

Call me Scrooge, but Christmas this year is going to be unlike previous Christmases because Grandpa and I have had it up to here with ungrateful, unappreciative, selfish-minded people who seem to think we have SANTA stamped on our foreheads.

Maybe there was a time, many years ago, when buying a gift for someone was based solely on well thought out searches for a gift based on what the person likes and enjoys without much thought about the price tag. That is the kind of Christmas shopping I always enjoyed, putting a lot of thought into whatever gift I chose for someone on our gift list, but just the mere thought of buying Christmas presents this year makes me wonder What the hell for?

If what matters most is the thought process that goes into choosing, buying, wrapping and giving a gift from the heart, then certain people on our annual gift list who shall remain nameless didn’t get the memo. Our usual list of around 20 people or so to buy Christmas gifts for has been reduced to a fraction of that, perhaps to the total count of just 4. Young grandchildren only, with no adults receiving Christmas gifts anymore.

Every Christmas holiday for the last few years has ended up with at least one person asking “Is this all that (insert name) gets?” That indicates that someone is counting the number of gifts received and if that number is not reached, then we haven’t lived up to the expected and anticipated responsibility as generous gift givers. Again, where does it say Santa on my forehead or on Grandpa’s forehead?

Being the primary person who buys or orders gifts during the holiday season, I’ve always put a lot of thought into the gifts purchased for each and every person on our gift list. We don’t own a money tree and we have our own bills, debts and expenses to pay off, and it has become obvious that the supposed “thought” of gift giving (at least for some) really means we’re expected to give generously regardless of our own financial situation.

Of those we used to buy gifts for at Christmas, most of them were very understanding when we let them know that we would not be buying Christmas gifts for adults anymore, but would stick to buying for the grand kids. Others were not so understanding, which as you may have guessed, are for the most part the very ones who have had the audacity to ask “Is this all that so-and-so gets?”

We’re supposed to concern ourselves with their feelings and Christmas wish lists during the holiday season or when Birthdays come around etc. The only two people who know our financial situation are the two people who should and need to know – Grandpa and I. We live in a nice house. So what. We drive nice cars. So what. We worked our butts off for what we have and anyone that allows the thought to cross their minds that we someone “owe” them a certain number of gifts – whether the gifts are inexpensive, cheap as hell, expensive or extravagant gifts just because we’re related in some way needs to take a step back and analyze their attitudes towards us.

We worked our butts off for what we have. We earned what we have from years and years of hard work at our jobs, buying things for ourselves that we wanted and needed with our own money as we could afford. The longer you work at your jobs, the sooner you will discover you can also begin to buy things you want or need because you’re able to afford it. Just because we can afford certain things doesn’t mean you are entitled to receiving a particular number of gifts from us or gifts that cost a certain amount of money, whether it be at Christmastime or any other holiday or special occasion.

We understand money is tight for many people, regardless of the recession or economic situation we’re in right now, and we don’t expect expensive gifts or a certain number of presents from our family or friends. However. If it’s true, that it’s the thought that counts when making decisions about gifts, than the thought shown towards us over the last few years has been nothing but selfishness and unrealistic expectations. Come to think of it – you know that thing about it’s the thought that counts about giving gifts of some kind? Yeah, that thing works both ways, ya know?

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