My mostly handmade Christmas

Note: If you happen to be reading this Mom, stop until we have exchanged gifts, you'll spoil the surprise!

My Christmas was mostly homemade, on my part at least. My brother, M-I-L and her twin sister came over Christmas morning for pancakes. I decided I wanted to display my holiday cards, didn't get many, mostly because I stopped sending them out to everyone because I just couldn't justify the paper use. I had some rope which I believe is jute, I cut a piece to a good size tied a knot on each end put a thumbtack inside the knot and hung or clipped cards onto the rope. Instant holiday card display.

I made some gift tags to go along with the pretty boxes I made from tea boxes. There was a box that had an add/coupon on the inside and one that I ripped too much for it to be considered pretty. I took parts of those boxes and glued the pieces to another piece of cardboard and made pretty matching tags.

I used the boxes for cookie, mmmmmmm cookies. I made Sandtarts for everyone, my favorite holiday cookie. A bit of foil and a stack of Sandtarts who wouldn't want those.

I made boxes for my Mom to take on her flight to Seattle tied with some hemp twine and my gift tags.

I put the boxes in a paper bag and found some Christmas stamps in my desk drawer and had some fun.
I used this same principle to wrap a calender and cd for Rich's Aunt. Cut up a paper bag for wrapping paper and used my Christmas stamps to decorate.

For my M-I-L and my husbands Grandma we got them a framed picture of the two of us and I added a card I decorated with stamps all tied together with hemp twine and a gift tag.
My mom got a framed picture too, an eye pillow I made, and a bookmark I made (more about those in a bit), wrapped in a t-shirt we bought her.
I bought my husband a new pair of headphones he desperately needed and quickly sewed a bag to put them in and added some tissue paper we had lying around.
Here are my cloth bookmarks I made. I used an old pair of jeans, cut off one of the legs, cut that into strips, sewed along the edges so they wouldn't completely fray and added a cute charm on the top. Quite easy and very useful and everyone seemed to really like them.

I also made a few lavender eye pillows from scraps I had lying around, I took my Mom's sewing machine earlier this year and never did anything with it and recently started teaching myself to sew, the bookmarks were one of my first attempts at doing something. I then found a box of scraps, a lot I recognized from Halloween costumes or pillows we had on the couch as kids. With some of the scraps I made lavender eye pillows. They are filled with flax seeds and dried lavender flowers, they smell delicious and are oh so relaxing.

For the people that I gave a bookmark and a eye pillow to I wrapped them together with hemp twine. They go together so well, don't you think.

One of Rich's other Aunt's got a framed photo (that I think has probably had mustaches and other things added to it already by Rich's uncle, hehe) and an eye pillow and I wrapped those two things together.

Everything is so simple yet still festive and pretty.

Picture post

Here are some pictures I have taken of animals at work and home recently. I keep meaning to post some of these as a Wordless Wednesday post but can never remember so I am posting them now or I may never get to them.

Lots of baby snakes.

Baby Eurydactylodes, such cute little geckos.

Atticus curled up on a big but tiny to him bed.

Sweet Maya girl waiting for me to finish up so we can play

My kingsnake

My red eared slider Sam relaxing

and his tank mate Ella relaxing

My cat Otsego relaxing on my brother, yes she is relaxed...she's odd like that

My brothers cat, Anubis

His other cat, Ramesses

Play in mud to stop allergies?

From Care2: Play in the mud to stop allergies?

This is just too perfect for me and my blog. Guess we know why I don't have allergies, I use to play in the mud and dirt and sad and manure piles looking for worms and other creepy crawlies for HOURS on end as a kid. I wonder why it took until my mid twenties for me to get the nick name mudnessa, before that it was just Nessa, guess it took an outsider to dub me with the really perfect nickname. It was just the way Nessa was to my family, hehe.

Old pants to cat bed

I have quite a few old pair of pants that I will NEVER fit into again or are ripped and not worth repairing. I had some of them folded on a chest in the bedroom and Harley Quinn loved sleeping there. So to make it look better I decided to sew an actual bed from two pairs of corduroy pants I had. I was inspired by Pants Pillow on The Greenist, there was also a post about Make Your Own Dog Bed, I kinda put the two ideas together. My sewing skills are very very minimal, I have my moms machine and I am teaching myself, there are a few basic things I can't figure out but I do it my own way. The bed looks pretty good but it no where near square but it's a cat bed so they don't care. I made the bed two months ago and Harley is no longer sleeping on that chest, I moved the bed the other morning to in front of the glass door and she is using it now, so is Otsego. Success! I am so excited they are using it. I made it a bit more soft and fluffy feeling by putting two old sheets in it, they were both fitted sheets that had ripped.

Here is Harley Quinn on it

And here it is with them both ignoring it.

I have a lot more pairs of pants that I don't/can't wear any more, mostly jeans and some other nice cotton blends, I also have a lot of other clothes I am no longer able to wear and hope to find something to do with them. (I am reusing a pair of jeans for Christmas presents but I don't wanna give away what people are getting so I can't discuss it.)

Pretty boxes

I re-arranged the furniture in the apartment a few weeks ago, I ended up putting my desk in our extra room along with a lot of other stuff, with the idea to make a sort of craft area for me, since I would like to start sewing. I've made a cat bed that my cats apparently don't like but that's the way it goes with things you make specifically for cats.

I finally got around to arranging and cleaning that room today and I started making a bunch of piles or random things I don't use very often, if ever, but didn't want to get rid of. One pile had things like a pencil sharpener, an OLD pretty little stapler with lady bugs on it, a single hole puncher that punches in the shape of a bunny, some 2 inch colored pencils that use to be full size.

Earlier in the day I emptied another box of tea, I drink A LOT of tea, and put it up on one of the top cabinets in the kitchen. I keep the boxes because the insides are really pretty and I knew I could do something with them. I had often thought of turning them inside out and re-using them as gift boxes or something. Today I finally got to it and instead used them as boxes for storing not often used desk items.

I started with three boxes of Yogi Tea, I have many more in the cabinet.

Aren't the insides pretty, how could I throw these away, well recycle them technically.

I carefully opened up the box, it was only held together at the flap openings on the top and bottom and a tab on the side.

Once opened I made sure to bend the creases in the opposite direction they were in so the box folds together and lays more square when re-folded. I then re-folded the center pieces in opposite direction and secured the one side tab with tape, the only thing I had on hand, will probably need to go back and use some glue too at some point.

REMINDER *Need to remember to pick up some glue.*

Pretty box all put together.

There are little obvious glue tabs left but they can be covered with a ribbon or gift tag if using as a gift box, I just oriented the box so that side is not in view.

My favorite tattoo

People ask me what my favorite tattoo is. I can't pick one, they are all special to me, that's why I got them. The eye of horus on my ankle is special because it was my first (besides the obvious meaning of the symbol itself), the ankh on my left wrist is also special because it was my second and reflamed my addiction (also besides the obvious meaning of the symbol). The scales, as in reptile, on my right leg are just pure awesome and they hurt like hell and my work life is all about reptiles right now. The mermaid on my left upper arm is downright beautiful, it is adapted from a piece by the artist Erte, Bettie Page on my right upper arm is Bettie Page nothing more needs to be said, I love that woman. Finally the black and grey flames on my lower right arm are just awesome, they are flames and I am very fond of flames!

I can't even pick a favorite of my husbands, but I can narrow it down to two. First goes to the interpretation of the cover of the band Unmerciful's Unmercifully Beaten Album, choosen by yours truly. Saw them in concert and love the cover art, fits perfectly on the back of Rich's right arm.

The second is this evil devil thing ripping it's face open, he found the original art on the internet, not sure of its origin.

I like all his tattoos, although sometimes waking up in the morning and seeing one of the above or the viking skeleton warrior that is between these two staring at me is kinda freaky. I know they are kinda dark and evil and probably not for everyone, or most but I love them and perhaps one day I will have something dark and evil on me. That's just the kinda girl I am, I guess.