Now, I like me some fun reindeer games a fun party so I’ve been really looking forward to my husband (Chef Kev’s) Christmas work party this year. It’s always been a blast in the past (not a blast from the past – but a blast IN the past) so when I was asked to design this year’s party favours (to be on the table when guests arrive) the discussion went something like this…

Kev: “hey, will you make the party favours for my work party this year. Only if you have time, no pressure”

Elaine: {inside voice – what! Christmas! crafty stuff! Designy things! party favours? I’m SO in! … but play it cool…} Outside voice: “sigh, oh, okay… but only if you make me dinner for a week”

Kev: “I already do. Oh, and thanks”

Elaine {inside voice again – Dang! Foiled again by my quick tongue. Must. think. out details longer. next. time.} Outside voice: “right”.

So that was that. Operation design party favours had begun.

Before I lose you, here is what I did. Details below if you’ve read this far (and thanks if so).

And here is how it came to be.

I went to pinterest for some inspiration and searched ‘Christmas party favours’. I had a few criteria when searching. 1) It had to be relatively easy to do as I had to do 50 of them and 2) It had to be relatively cost effective, as well… I had to do 50 of them!

This caught my eye.

(source: “A personal touch” blog via pinterest) 

But I wanted to give it my own spin. So I set out redesigning the header card portion.

And today (well every day) it is free for you if you’d like it!

Once I had designed my header card and sticker I purchased my brown and red reindeer noses. You can buy whatever you’d like of course, but for mine I bought: milk chocolate covered caramels, malt balls and jujubes as well as dark chocolate covered espresso beans and almonds. Rudolph’s nose is a cherry sour.

I then purchased 4″x6″ treat bags (lollipop bags) at the craft store (Michaels) and convinced Chef Kev to help me divy up the chocolate!

I trimmed down my header cards that I had printed on card stock (which are actually 4.25″ wide so there is a slight over hang on each side) and scored them with my paper cutter. I happen to have a trimmer that has a setting made for scoring but you can use a bone scorer or even lightly score with an exacto blade if you are comfortable with that route (do not press hard as you will cut right through – you want to apply very light pressure to simply cut only the top fibres of your paper). You always want to score on the side that you are folding away from (so in this case, the printed side).

Score right along the edge where the red ‘front’ meets the green ‘back’.

I put the headers aside for a moment while I moved on to folding the top edge of the treat bags over (about 1/2 – 3/4″ and stapled once on each side. Chef Kev helped here too!

Then I used a tape runner (that I already had but you can get them at the craft store in the scrapbooking section) and applied a strip along the inside BACK ONLY of the card (bottom part). You don’t need to do the top/front as your round circle sticker will seal that side.

Then I lined the top of my bag fold into the crease and pressed down along the tape.

After I folded the top over I applied my round sticker (printed on “Avery 5294″ 2.5” circle label stock) to close the front part of the header card and attach it to the bag.

I actually found if I applied the sticker upside down I had more control. You may have noticed in the free template image earlier in this post that I left a blank spot where the label goes. The label stock has a bit of ‘show through’ so you could see it through the sticker if you had the pattern run across the whole card. It actually works well as you have a ‘guide’ to line your sticker up to so that each favour looks the exact same (sticker isn’t lower and higher as you look at different packages). Bonus 🙂

And now the really fun part – gluing Rudolph’s little nose on! For this I just used white craft glue and a toothpick to apply. I let the noses dry a few hours so that none would fall off in transport.

Here are a few pics of my workshop mid-nose application….

Did I mention I had to do 50 of these!?

Once they were dry it was time for the ‘after shot’!

There’s a new reindeer in town and his nose ain’t red. It’s white. And ceramic. But he has just as much character as Ol’ Red and now (like R.dogdolf) a story that he can pass down to his grandkids too.

Sparkle is a relatively new Christmas decoration – I got him a few years back – but quickly became one of my faves. Allow me to introduce you…

Although I think this shot is funnier. Cue toddler hand stage right (or left?) I don’t know, I’m a designer, not an actress.

Anyway, what you may have noticed aside from the cute little hand and awesome reindeer is lack of antlers… or part lack. Sparkle is ‘placking’ (part-lacking – and yes, I just made that word up) antlers.

He actually placked antlers last year and got them fixed but this year when I pulled him out, he pulled another plack on me. Oh Sparkle…

You can see his previous scars and new breaks. Poor little Sparkle.

It didn’t even cross my mind to get rid of him because how can you turn your back on a ceramic reindeer in his time of need!? So, I put my thinking antlers cap on and decided that I’d glue him back together and add some… well, sparkle to hide his wounds.

Here is my arsenal of medical supplies.

I used the crazy glue (right) to piece Sparkle back together and lucky for me I had further plans because at this stage his gaps were more like crevices.

Yikes! So, I added some glitter to hide Sparkle’s scars. If you find yourself doing a similar surgery in the future I’d suggest making sure your glitter is ‘fine’ (see glitter pic above) versus the courser larger (old school) glitter. It creates more a shimmery effect and the pieces will stick better since they are more ‘powder like’ in consistency. Great for hiding boo boos.

I won’t bore you with the surgery details as I’m sure you have all applied glitter before. But it basically went like this – brush glue on, sprinkle on glitter, tap off, repeat. Don’t forget to do this over a paper plate so you can easily fold the plate in half creating a trough to pour your excess back into the glitter container.

After he rested in recovery Sparkle looked like this!

Dare I say I’m even more in love with him now?

And here he is taking his rightful place on my Christmas mantel (which I blogged about here).

What a cutie. I guess I should really call him Glitter now but we all know that that’s just a bad Mariah Carey movie so it wouldn’t be fair. Plus he looks like a ‘Sparkle”. Yes, my ceramic reindeer is a male. And I call him Sparkle. Could be worse?

{Non-hate clause: I actually like Mariah Carey}

Things are getting spicy over here! Okay, not really but this old spice rack got an update. Not too bad in her ‘day’, but looking a tad wimpy by today’s standards. Who am I kidding, it’s just a spice rack. Standards = none.

I’m back! I had stopped blogging as I didn’t think I had enough time… but realized how much I loved doing it so decided to do my best to MAKE time! What is time if not spent doing things you love right?

Here is a little project that I worked on lately…

This antique sewing machine is used as our front entry way table but wasn’t quite vibing with our décor. It’s a sentimental piece as I got it at an auction with my dad and he refinished it for me, but it was time for an update. The old finish was a bit too rustic and the hardware needed some TLC.

My goal was to obtain a more modern finish – darker and more walnut/expresso vs ‘oak’. And to introduce a little sparkle to the lack lustre drawers!

Plus, I had accidentally given it a water stain it a few years ago so I owed it. Woops!

… And these knobs were looking more wobbly than Lindsay Lohan on a Tuesday after a night out on the town.

So I took it out to the garage and got my groove sand on.

After my sandathon I wiped it down with a damp cloth, applied some wood conditioner, wiped that down, then applied two coats of the water based walnut stain I had purchased… and hated it. So, I applied a coat of espresso stain on top of that… and still hated it. The finish was much too RED for some reason. SO, I did what any insane determined blogger/DIY attempter would do. I cried softly and started again.

After two coats of just the espresso stain I was happy. And let’s face it, even if I wasn’t, this thing was going back into the entrance regardless.

So, here she is AFTER!

She looks good in her new dark get-up no?

Here is a close up of how the dark stain really helped accentuate the wood grain.

And NO more water stain!

The finishing touch was these glass knobs that I added. I think they help modernize the whole piece. So much lighter and prettier than the old ones (sorry Lindsay).

As I was screwing in the last knob I heard the cutest little voice behind me – “Mommy, I do it”. I turn around to find my 2.5 year old little Mr. Fix It with his tool puzzle – all ready to help mommy screw on the hardware.

Since I had just finished screwing in the last knob I undid them all (what is it about this project and doing everything twice?) and my helper assisted in reapplying the finishing touches. From there he moved on to find more things that needed fixin’.

As he ‘worked’ I took more photos…

Have you stained anything recently? Any ‘helpers’ around your house? Been out on the town with Lindsay lately?

Oh, and Happy Thanksgiving to my American readers out there. Have a great long weekend!

There seems to be a bit of a rivalry going on at my house. Team Mantel vs. Team Bannister. It threatened to get ugly folks… but all is well that ends well.

Here’s how it all went down.

Banisters caught wind that Mantel had a painting party… but didn’t invite them (oh. oh. Drama). So, after a heart-to-heart (what, you don’t talk to your banisters?), I promised Banisters that they too could have a party of their own. And what did they want to wear? Well their LBDB’s of course!

Here is how Banisters looked before dressing up…

We have a few banisters like this around our house and I didn’t want to hear them whine too wanted to paint them all the same for cohesiveness.

Here is the signature drink that was served at the party, and a party goer partaking in a big sip…

Once drunk painted all the ladies banisters looked fantastic. LBB’s all around!

Oh, and for anyone following along, I used the RIGHT paint this time.

After we recently painted the main floor light the banisters just washed into the background. I feel it looks polished now. Black is the new banister.

Are you ready for the longest fireplace mantel make-over in history? No? Me neither. But that’s just what we have here folks.

After we finished repainting our main floor from an avocodo-ish green to a creamy bone colour our fireplace looked a little washed out all alone in the corner.

Don’t mind the painters tape, my brain works in weird ways. Take photos before Elaine… take them before. Anyway….

So, a little painting party was in order and black was going to be the guest of honour. My supply pile looked like this: