Home for Christmas with gifts and little ideas. :)

Hi my friends.

Guess you are all busy, busy, busy doing the last preparations for Christmas.

I'm preparing the last minute gifts, wrapping and making tags. I also need to plan some more cookies and what to cook for this christmas. :)

Today I'll share some affordable, heartwarming last-minute gifts.

The snow and FROST came to Oslo this week, and it is freezing cold ( - 10 degrees Celcius). I have a fire going on in my oven upstairs and downstairs - otherwise we'll freeze our toes off. ;)

This reminded me I must make sure my friends don't freeze too. I have gathered some smaller wodden sticks and tied them together with a pine branch and a matchstick box I decorated. Ready for a cozy fire.

This might seems like a strange gift to those of you that live in a warmer climate....but you know....in cold Norway we allways appreciate a cozy fire :)

Here is another fun and eartfriendly little gift for smaller kids. I found this idea at my friend Gigis blog, and I was delighted. I really LOVE the idea of reuse old crayons and make cute new ones that han be used by new little artists. :) You can find a great how-to tutorial on Gigis blog :)

The kids had their last day at school today, and they all wanted to bring presents for their friends This year - as we use to every year - we made some homemade gifts. And we chose to make homemade soaps and homemade raspberry candy.
Soap is easy to make, and the kids love to add scent and color and put the melted soap in the mould, and then take them out and wrap them in celophane when the soap has cooled.

Home made candy is really fun to make too. But it is WARM! so be aware. This is not for small kids. I have made candy with my kids for ceveral years and they love it.

This is a super affordable and pretty fast made gift. Perfect for little friends :)

Every year at this time I'm in need of cute gifttags, but I never seem to find time to make some.... So I decided to use leftover tags from 3ndypapir patterned paper, and then I bought some cute traditional scandinavian ornaments at IKEA and added with the tags
This serves as a extra gift too :)

And for some special presents I decided to make this super cute homemade bow.

Here is a step-by step how to make it:

Cut 8 stripes of patterned paper 3/4 inch X 4 1/2 inch
and one strip 3/4 inch X 3 1/2 inch

Using the 8 longer pieces, loop each paper, and glue to secure.

Adhere two loops together with adeshive in the middle.

glue two pieces together to make the first layer of the bow.

Glue the remaining two sets of loops together in the same way.

Adhere the two layers together.

Make a little circle of the shorter piece of paper and add it in the middle of the bow.

Voila! Bow is complete!

You can make a larger bow with one more layer too. :)

Thank you for popping by! And have a wonderful last week before Christmas :)

xo

HOME for christmas :) :)

WELCOME my friends!!

And again THANK YOU a million for all your sweet well wishes and comments.

I really feel better now. :)

And today I'm ready to invite you HOME for Christmas :)

I have started decorating my home a little bit. It is tradition for alot of people in Norway to decorate the tree and most of the house on the 23rd. We celebrate christmas eve on the 24th.

But because I LOVE all this decorating and creating and this season SO much I start a little earlier putting up little by little of my decorations.

I made these cute paper trees, and they are now standing in my livingroom.

They are so fun to make, and can be made in many different ways.

I'll show you how I made my circle-tree. :)

You'll need a foam "tree" a pot, a little bit of Oasis, hot glue / gluegun, a 1 1/2 inch circle punch and LOTS of punchout paper-circles. I've used scraps of patterned paper to punch out circles. bead-headed pins (if you want)

Glue the circles on to the foam tree, and secure with pins if you like.
I started on the bottom of the tree and glued circles round and round in a kind of random way.

When you have covered the tree with circles you can add a little wooden stick on the bottom of the tree. I found a little branch from a tree in my garden. I tucked the stick into the tree and glued it to secure.

I put the Oasis in the pot and put the tree into the Oasis, and glued to secure. Then I found some nature fiber to cover the Oasis.

Voila!

A fun little tree to brighten up your home :)

----

As you know I have this advent tradition with my kids, we do different kins of things every day in december as our calendar.

Recently we needle felted some woolen hearts.

They LOVE to needle felt, and we use to do this every year.

this is one of the things they are really looking foreward to.

Here is one of the hearts we felted.

I've put it up in my candelair over my dining table.

To needle felt is SO FUN and easy, and I tell you, even my husband loves it, and he have some skills! This year he felted an ice-bear. (I'll show you pictures another day)

Eirun is one of the master-felters in our family. Here is her heart that got wings :)

Here is a mini step-by-step how to do it.

You need real lambs-wool, a styrofoam block to have under your project and a special felting needle. And then you just felt away! :)

OK

This was it for this wednesday.

See you back on friday for more christmas inspo!

:)

sweets

Hi my friends.

It's snowing in Oslo today, and it's starting to look more and more like a white Christmas :) I like winter, and I like snow. I like how the snow cover the landscape and nature and make everything "go to sleep" until dear, warm, sweet spring arrives.

Snowy weather makes it good to stay indoor too. Light some candles and the fire to make it warm and cozy.

I decided to decorate a little bit today.

I got myself this cute "merry christmas" wire-hanging, and I decorated it with some "vintage cards" by 3ndypapir and some miniature ornaments.

And I have made some sweets :)

Honey-Ginger snaps
and Whalnut fudge. :)

Yummy, yummy!

Would you like some?

Honey-ginger snaps.

I LOVE these little spicy bites with some tea. :)

Ingredients
1/3 cup honey
1/4 cup butter
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 cup granulated sugar
3 Tbsp. finely chopped crystallized ginger (I've used ground ginger and a little bit fresh chopped ginger)
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. ground white pepper (optional)
1 egg, lightly beaten
Powdered sugar

Directions
1. In a small saucepan, combine honey and butter. Cook and stir over low heat until butter melts. Remove from heat. Pour mixture into a large bowl and cool to room temperature.
2. In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, granulated sugar, ginger, baking soda, and if desired, pepper. Set aside.
3. Stir egg into cooled honey mixture. Gradually stir in flour mixture until combined; knead in the last of the flour mixture by hand, if necessary. Cover and chill about 1 hour or until dough is easy to handle.
4. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Divide dough into 12 portions.* On a lightly floured surface, roll each portion into a 10-inch-long rope. Cut ropes into 1/2-inch pieces. Place pieces 1/2 inch apart in an ungreased shallow baking pan.
5. Bake in the preheated oven for 6 to 8 minutes or until tops are very lightly browned. Transfer cookies to paper towels to cool. Roll in powdered sugar.

For my European friends:

You can easily convert the amounts to kg, litre etc and Farenheit to Celcius HERE:

http://www.worldwidemetric.com/Measurements.html

And here is the recepie for

Whalnut fudge.

I use Whalnuts instead of Pecan nuts. :)

Ingredients
2 cups packed dark brown sugar
1 cup buttermilk
2 tablespoons butter
2 cups broken or chopped pecans (I use whalnuts )

Directions
1. Butter the sides of a heavy 2-quart saucepan. In the saucepan combine brown sugar and buttermilk. Cook over medium-high heat to boiling, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon to dissolve sugar. This should take 6 to 8 minutes. Avoid splashing mixture on sides of pan. Carefully clip candy thermometer to pan. Cook over medium-low heat, stirring occasionally, until thermometer registers 234 degree F, soft-ball stage. Mixture should boil at a moderate, steady rate over entire surface. Reaching soft-ball stage should take 20 to 25 minutes.
2. Remove saucepan from heat. Add the 2 tablespoons butter, but do not stir. Cool, without stirring, to 150 degree F. This should take about 30 minutes. Remove candy thermometer from saucepan. Immediately stir in pecans. Beat vigorously with a wooden spoon until candy is just beginning to thicken, but is still glossy. This should take 3 to 4 minutes.`
3. Quickly drop the candy from a teaspoon onto a baking sheet lined with waxed paper. (I just put the entire candy-mixture into one rectangular box covered with a baking sheet. I cut the fudge in squares when it has cooled. If you want to make pralines you have to work really fast. The candy will soon get stiff.

If it does you might stir in a few drops hot water, or put the saucepan on low heat to make it all melt a little bit. )

Enjoy with a cup of tea or coffee. :)

Have a great WEEKEND!!

HOME for Christmas :)

Hi my friends and WELCOME to my "HOME for Christmas". It's 2nd of december today, and here in Oslo the weather finally changed from grey, wet november-rain to ice-cold, crisp, frozen december-winter-weather. We made the seasons FIRST ginger-bread yesterday, and the gingerbread smell fill the house. We also decorated LOTS of gingerbread "lollies" for the christmas marked next weekend. These cute lollies makes great gifts for the kids friends and the kids in the neighborhood.

I used pre-made gingerbread dough. (I don't have any really good gingerbread recepie :( ) Anyhow, the premade from IKEA works fine too :)

I cut the cakes with a round bowl and used a small cookie-cutter to make the shape in the middle. Added a lot of cruhched candy in the "window" before baking the cookies in the oven. The candy will melt and make the cute window. Let the cookies cool of for a while before you take them away from the baking-paper.

I've decorated the cookies with sugar frosting. :) Here are some pictures from cold, sunny Oslo today. Look at the frozen rose. Amazing, huh?:

Maybe some of these....or some other of the outdoor pics I took today will find their way to some friends walls during christmas. Beautiful outdoor photos allways makes great gifts :)

I made this little giftbag and filled it with a secret gift for my SIL today. Have to make one more for my BILs wife too ;) ;) The bag is super easy to make. You can download the pattern below. :)
Perfect for a little gift or to fill with some sweets.

Have a WONDERFUL day! and THANKS for popping by!

Little giftbags and advent-calendar

Hi, and welcome to my "home for Christmas, day 2!!! :) :)
I'm really in a bit of a hurry today. I'm off to Moss to have a class.
So I'll show you two fast and easy little projects.
I really LOVE this little folded "french fry bag" Perfect for a sweet little gift. I've filled mine with some chocolate hearts.


Here are easy step-by step pictures, how to fold this bag:

Start with a square piece of double sided patterned paper.

mine is 8X8inch.

Patterned paper by 3ndypapir.

fold in half

take one of the corners and fold it over to the other side

do exactly the same with the other corner.

Fold one of the upper corner down to secure the two folded corners.

No glue needed.

Your box is ready to be embellished and filled. :)

VOILA!!

Here in Norway we use to have count-down calendars for the kids in december before christmas evening (we celebrate the 24th.)

Some people fill the calendar with little things others have chipboard-calendars with cute little pictures and stories. I fill my calendar with things to DO with my kids.

I love to take time this season, and TIME is my gift for them. o we have some little projects we make every day before christmas.

Like baking, making stuff, maybe go skiing (if the snow arrive)...and so on.

Here are some nice paper-bags, perfect for advent-calendar filled with some little surprises or for a little fast gift. :)

I decorated mine with cute tags punched out of patterned paper by 3ndypapir.

THANKS for popping by!!

See you!