A fun paper doll to download and print

 

 Oh, how I loved paper dolls as a child!  I spent hours with them, even making my own at times.  I would trace around existing paper dolls, using colorful magazine photos for the "fabric".  A photo of carpet, for example, would provide a nice large amount of area to cut clothes out of.  When I acquired a wonderful Betsy McCall Fashion Designer Kit, I traced and cut out paper dolls from the figures provided.  I then made outfits using the vast array of components provided -- skirts, blouses, dresses, slacks, jackets, and much more, tracing, coloring, adding tabs and cutting them out.

I actually have an entire Pinterest board called Fun with Paper Dolls. A screenshot of part of it is at the top of the post.

Here is a fun free download from Poppie Cotton: Betsy's Sewing Kit.  This would be a sweet treat for a little girl in your life.  It includes an adorable doll and a few chickens, plus two dresses, overall shorts, and rubber boots. The description reads "Ready for work, play, and church after chores."

 
 It coordinates with fabric of the same name, Betsy's Sewing Kit.  This fabric is designed by Lori Woods.  The Poppie Cotton website explains, "  Betsy’s Sewing Kit is a nostalgic memory from the McCalls magazine that used to come to your home each month. There was an iconic paper doll call Betsy McCall. This collection reaches into the past to bring relevance to what Betsy would have in her sewing kit. The beautiful color palette of navy blue, bright reds, pinks, teals, mints and yellows are a glorious combination that makes you want to head to your sewing room to play all day. There are darling strawberries, quilt patterns, baby chicks, tea kettles and many floral designs."  The fabrics are indeed absolutely adorable and fun.

Have fun with this freebie paper doll set!

Thinking about putting away your Christmas wrappings?

I'm thinking about it.  Only thinking, at this point.  I may do just a bit of after-Christmas shopping if I find something I need in the clearance at the supermarket or other stores.  And then, of course, I will add any gift-wrapping supplies to my stash and will attempt to get it organized before storing.  Tags are something I often need, as I prefer not to use the stick-on ones.  Sometimes I can't resist, though -- there are such pretty ones out there!

In sifting through my saved ideas for my December Daily posts  here in the Christmas kitchen, I found some wonderful free printable gift tags.

This post: Ultimate guide to free printable gift tags from Melissa at The Inspired Room, is definitely the ultimate.  It is a 2016 post so I went through it to see if all of the links still work.  I found only a few which did not, and most of those can still be accessed by going to the home page of the particular blogger and searching the freebies. 

In one such search I discovered these Printable gift tags from The DIY Mommy,  in some of the most luscious colors imaginable.  If you need tags for next year, you will want to check out these ideas.

Or, you could just do as I have done and make tags out of Christmas cards (like the ones illustrating this post) from previous years.  I'm finding that these tags are handy to tuck into a Christmas card or an Etsy order as a little added gift.  Over on my other blog, I'm going to be reminding people about how to make these, not that it needs a lot of explanation.

Have fun with these tag ideas!

Free Christmas printable kit!

Image from The Elli Blog

Just in time for Rudolph Day, here is a fun free holiday printable kit from The Elli Blog to help with your Christmas planning.  The ideas and printables are so inspiring!  I love the rustic wood look of the backgrounds and the colorful touches of classic red and green.

I downloaded the food tags and the recipe cards and they are very pretty.  In addition, there are stickers, gift tags in both round and rectangular options, wrappers for jars or boxes, gift wrap, and much more. 

The recipe cards would be great if you are giving a kitchen gift and want to include the recipe.  Or you could print out a half dozen recipe cards with favorite Christmas recipes and tie them up with jute or red or green twine to make a lovely little gift or stocking stuffer.

The possibilities are endless with this free printable kit.  Have fun with it!

Cute printable plaid gift tags!

Photo and design by Kelly at Live Laugh Rowe

 Here's a fun idea for your gift tags this coming Christmas -- and you could get busy making these right away!  These free Printable Plaid Gift Tags from Kelly at Live Laugh Rowe are absolutely adorable.

Like many people, I love plaid, and these printable tags are available for download in a soft red plaid, a soft green plaid, and a muted combination of both colors.  They are for personal use only, but I'm sure you knew that.  I like Kelly's suggestion of putting a kraft reinforcing sticker around the punched hole in the tags.

These look great with kraft or brown-paper wrapped packages, but they would also look nice with white or a solid red or green that coordinate with the colors of the tags.

Have fun with these!

Some small and simple kitchen gifts

I've blogged about this before, but I was looking back in my July archives and decided to share it again.  This post from July 2007 details my nifty idea for Christmas giving -- I'd been inspired by seeing some spice mixes packaged in fabric bags along with recipes, and thought this would be an idea I'd like to try.

This 2012 post shares a link for many baking, beverage, and seasoning mixes as well as some of my own recipes.

And this post from my regular blog, written in 2010,  describes the Kitchen Gift in a Pie Plate which is pictured at the top of the post.  This was such a fun gift to put together!

You can see that I've made pumpkin pie spice and apple pie spice, and then I made some of my favorite pie recipes into a little cookbook to go along with them, packaging the entire gift in a unique spatterware pie plate. 

[Edited to add: You can find these recipe cards at Graphic Garden.  In the left sidebar you will see the category "Free Printables."  Down near the bottom of the list, click on "Recipe Cards".  There are so many beautiful designs to choose from!  The  ones I've used here are from the "Seasonal" category and are called "Winter cabin/blank".  At the top of the "Recipe Cards" page, you will find detailed instructions for how to use them.  You can either print them out blank and write on them, or save them to your computer and type on them as I have done here. ]  

I'm starting to get inspired by the mix idea all over again, in fact.  Hope others have as much fun with this idea as I did!

A fun repurposing project -- Salt & Pepper Angels from The Thrifty Rebel

Photo from The Thrifty Rebel

I've had this project pinned for some months now to my Crafting for Christmas Pinterest board.  This idea for Salt & Pepper Angels is from Tuula at The Thrifty Rebel and is so cute.  I love that it repurposes a number of different items.  Other people must like it too, because almost every day someone is repinning this.

As you can see, the base of each angel is a salt or pepper shaker minus its shaker top.  Each is filled with beads with a touch of glitter.  The wings are butterfly shapes cut from old sheet music -- in this case, Christmas carols.

If you don't have any sheet music, or none that you wish to cut up, check out this link for: Printable Christmas Music Papers.  Here's a sample:

Photo from Knick of Time

Back to the angels -- the heads are tiny Christmas balls and the halos repurposed objects like jump rings or washers.  Bits and pieces of trim form the collars and arms. 

I think that I have everything I need to make some of these.  My salt and pepper shakers are more on the square side, but I think they will still be cute even though not as graceful a shape as these.  You could make these now and have them ready for Christmas!

Christmas conversation starters from Skip to My Lou

A page from my tattered Trim the Christmas Tree Little Golden Book

 Wouldn't it be fun to have some really interesting, meaningful conversations, that the kids could also take part in, around the dinner table on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day?  A few years ago my hubby and I took a little getaway in August and visited a Christmas shop in the area we were visiting.  I found a neat little round box of Christmas conversation starters and purchased it.  I actually remembered to bring it out and use it on Christmas Eve that year, but have forgotten it until now.  This year the grandkids might enjoy it even more, now that they are older.

If your family could use some help getting a fun conversation going, check out this idea from Cindy at Skip to My Lou.  She has some free printable Christmas conversation starters that you might like to use.  The questions are printed in the center of pretty green and red wreaths, so they are pretty and festive as well.

Or, you might like to just take this idea and make up some interesting conversation starter cards of your very own.  It could be really fun to personalize them to suit your own family yet still make the questions general enough so a guest of any age could answer.  This would be an easy project to do for Christmas in July and have all of your conversation cards ready for the holiday dinners!

Some simple after-Christmas crafting

Super simple gift tags

Since Christmas, I've been able to craft a few simple items so thought I would quickly share them.  One of my goals this year is to nurture my creativity, so I'm not losing any time getting started.  I'm trying to do something creative every day, even if it's only cooking or thinking of a creative solution or tactic in homemaking.

For Christmas gifts for my daughters and several friends, I made these fabulous "Best of My Days" cards from Ashley at Under the Sycamore.  I had such fun designing the packaging.  This is one that I made as a New Year gift for a friend. 

Christmas Star dishcloth

Gift tags from 2014's Christmas cards

Winter-themed table topper (more pics on my regular blog)

More of the simple gift tags I made from the metal-rimmed paper tags and small embellishments

These projects are simple, but they have been fun for me and have definitely helped me stay sane during a cold and busy January!

Free printable Christmas labels to print now!

Image from World Label Blog

Just think, you could print out these fun labels anytime and have them ready for Christmas!  I'm sharing links to 2 different sets of labels from World Label Blog, a fantastic resource for ordering all shapes, sizes and types of labels which also boasts an amazing array of gorgeous freebies to download and print.  You can even customize many of them with your own choice of wording and fonts.  If you have difficulty finding a good variety of labels at your local stores, I suggest you try World Label Blog.

Here's the link for the first set (pictured above): Holly Jolly Labels by Ink Tree Press.  I printed out the address labels with my name and address last year and was very pleased with them.  So cute!

And here's the link for the second set (pictured below): Happy Holidays labels by The Shy Socialites.  These are very nice also and even include such extras as labels for water bottles, CDs or DVDs, and tags for candy canes.  How fun!

Image from World Label Blog

Have fun with these!  I love free printables, don't you?

December 2 ~ a fabulous resource for Christmas recipe cards!

Photo from Shabby Princess

Late yesterday afternoon, I was doing a quick search for printable, free Christmas recipe cards for a project I was preparing to work on.  I found the most fabulous free collection I have ever seen, and just want to share this resource with all of you.  The site is  Shabby Princess and the specific recipe card collection is this one: Shabby Princess holiday recipe collection.

I made up some of the recipe cards (adding my own recipe) and was so pleased with how they turned out.  (I chose the images I liked, pasted them into a drawing document and added the text using the font, size, and color of my choice.  So much fun.)   Several years later, I used some of these for other projects as well. 

If you could use some pretty and unique Christmas recipe cards for yourself or for gifts, check out this resource.  You'll be glad you did!

Lovely printable Christmas tags

Image by Wild@heart

Yesterday I was browsing around on a couple of my Pinterest boards, and on the Scrapbooking & Paper crafts board I found some things I wanted to download.  In the process of checking them out, I found some beautiful Christmas tags and place cards, so thought I would share them here today.

Check out the links for these lovely printables (which are free for personal use only):


Christmas Name Placecards

Merry Christmas Tags

Angel Notecards

Image by Wild@heart

Have fun with these gorgeous printables!

Cute Christmas printables featuring Mason jars

Image by Twigg Studios

In search of a quick and fun craft idea to post about today, I found these adorable free printables!  There's a Mason jar holding twigs and berries, an inverted Mason jar serving as a cloche for a tiny Christmas tree -- and then there are gift tags which feature both designs!

Go here to check it out: Christmas Mason Jar Clip Art.  And have fun with these sweet designs!

Recipe Cards ~ a fun stocking stuffer idea

Recipe card above is just a sample of the selection at Graphic Garden.

A fun little stocking stuffer for cooks of all ages is recipe cards.  There are so many great free printable recipe cards out there!  Print them out on card stock, cut them out and tie a  stack of them together with a ribbon, jute, or baker's twine.  You have a sweet stocking stuffer all ready to go!

You need not restrict yourself to Christmas themed recipe cards, though there are tons of them out there.  Graphic Garden has many, many designs available in all different themes.  Check them out here: Free Printable Recipe Cards.  There are all manner of seasonal themes, plus food themes like pie, cake, bread, preserves, tea, and so on.

Shabby Princess is another site that has some wonderful free recipe cards to download.  Check them out here: Shabby Princess holiday recipe collection!   This is one of the nicest sets I've ever seen.

Just one example from the Shabby Princess holiday recipe collection

I found these Free Printable Gingerbread Recipe Cards via Tipnut's Crafty Christmas.  Incidentally, I now find that the Crafty Christmas page has disappeared and the link I shared no longer works.  I've made inquiries and am trying to find out what happened with it.

Tipnut does have a very nice printable recipe card collection and I hope you can access it here: Tipnut's recipe card collection.  There are over 55 different designs linked to.  The cards are made with all sorts of different motifs from retro to modern, flowers to food, and everything in between.  I fell in love with this one: vintage baking girl, which shows a 1950s little girl frosting cookies.

Why not print out a few recipe cards to tuck in the Christmas stocking of your favorite cook?

Absolutely adorable ornaments ... from paint sticks!

Photo and design by Today's Fabulous Finds

So my plan for today was to share a simple tutorial on putting together cross-stitch ornaments.  I've made many over the years, some finished very simply and others made stuffed with a music box inside.  There are a few that we put on our tree every year.  But do you think I can find pictures of them?  Nope.  Most of them predated digital cameras, and I just haven't thought to get pictures of them on this camera.  And I really, really don't want to venture into our extremely hot attic to try and figure out what box of ornaments they might be in.  Maybe I can whip up an ornament to use as an example here, but it won't be until later in the month.

My plan B was to look at Tipnut's Homemade Ornaments and see if I could find some good ideas.  This one caught my eye because the ornaments look similar to some little unpainted wooden signs I have.  But no -- these are made from paint sticks (or paint stirrers) and they are so sweet!  Go here for the tutorial:  printable paint stick ornaments.  I definitely need to make some of these.  Maybe you do also!  Have fun!

So pretty -- Christmas chalkboard printables!

One of the Christmas Chalkboard Printables from Nest of Posies

 These free Christmas Chalkboard Printables are some of the prettiest Christmas art that I have seen in awhile.  I am in awe of people who can create this sort of thing. 

So if there's still a corner of an entryway or somewhere else in your home that could use a decorative touch, print out and frame one of these.  It will be a difficult choice to decide which one -- they are all lovely.  I downloaded three!

Free Gooseberry Patch Christmas tags to download!

Art by Gooseberry Patch -- this is one of their free desktop wallpapers!

 If you love the gorgeous Gooseberry Patch art work as much as I do, you will want to head over to their blog and check out the free Gooseberry Patch Christmas tags!  There are two different sets, so you can choose just one or download both.  They will add a glorious touch of Gooseberry Patch to your gift wrapping!  Have fun!

Free Christmas cupcake wrappers at Food Art Party!

Cover those plain cupcake papers with a pretty wrapper!

Are you thinking ahead for Christmas kitchen gifts?  How about Christmas parties?  If you plan to bake some fabulous cupcakes for these occasions, you will want to take a look at these free printable cupcake wrappers from Food Art Party.  There are ten different designs, from Christmas trees to snowflakes to vintage Bingo cards.  Some of the designs are for winter, not just Christmas, so they are even more versatile and would work for New Year's or any winter occasion.

In fact, I just happened to think, these would also work great as muffin wrappers.  I do have muffins on my short list of kitchen gifts to make, though I do not have cupcakes listed (yet), so I will be printing out some of these to wrap around my muffins for gifting.

You'll find the wrappers here -- Free Printable Christmas Cupcake Wrappers -- along with directions for using them.  Have fun with these!  They will kick your kitchen gifts up a notch, for sure!

Free Christmas Letter Templates from Better Homes and Gardens

Have you written your Christmas letter yet?  Or would you just like some nifty Christmas paper to print out recipes and lists on?  Head on over to Better Homes & Gardens for some free Christmas Letter Templates!  I think this link will take you directly to the vintage ornament stationery design, which is very cute, but if you click on "show all thumbnails" near the top right, you will see around 35 different designs to choose from.  These are free pdf downloads and there are many terrific designs.  Have fun!

Betsy McCall Paper Dolls!

As mentioned yesterday, I think girls today miss out on a lot of fun with paper dolls.  I loved paper dolls as a child and I always liked it when my grandmother passed her McCall's magazine on to us with the paper doll page intact.  Betsy McCall was so cute, had such nifty outfits and fun adventures!  I was in seventh heaven the year my parents gave me a Betsy McCall Fashion Designer Kit (complete with light box and a whole portfolio of components to design literally hundreds of outfits).

So a few years ago I was delighted when my daughter discovered printable Betsy McCall paper dolls on line.  You can check it out here: Betsy McCall paper dolls.  This site has 10 years worth of Betsy McCall paper doll pages, with 12 months for each year.  To access all of the paper dolls for a particular year, just click on the year -- 1951, 1955, etc.  From there you can click on the pictured pages for each month to print the ones you want.

A small cropped version of one of the pages

So much fun!

Winter Holiday Paper Dolls

Here is a link to more free printables.  These adorable Winter Holiday Paper Dolls would make a wonderful gift for a young girl; you could print them out and even include scissors and maybe a nice rectangular tin to keep them in.  These pdf files even include some accessories like a Christmas tree, fireplace, etc.  If you look around on the site you will find paper dolls for other seasons like Halloween and Thanksgiving.  I think that girls today often miss out on the fun of paper dolls.  Why not introduce them to that old-fashioned pastime this holiday?