Christmas Charger

This post will be short and sweet as I just wanted to share a new Christmas Charger that I made for our neighbors. They always come over with a huge plate of home made goodies or other treats for every special occasion. So I try and find little gifts that I can make to return the favor, that and they are the best neighbors we could ask for!

I'm not exactly sure where I found this saying as I know I found it off the Internet. If I do not give someone proper credit for it, I apologize, but it has been sitting in my huge list of files for over a year now. I love the saying and it fits my neighbors perfectly. I used light beige, outdoor vinyl on a dark red Christmas charger and here is my finished product.

I like it as the plate and design is nice and simple, but displays a very meaningful message. I hope my neighbors like it as well!

Cookie Exchange Party

I know it's been awhile since my last post but with a very busy Thanksgiving weekend and the holidays quickly approaching, time is going by way too fast! One of the activities that I have been working on for the holidays is a Christmas Cookie Exchange party! The last two weeks I have spent quite a few late lights, along with my best friend who co-hosted the party with me, making prizes, establishing a set of "rules", creating decorations, baking and everything else that a successful party requires! The "rules" was my favorite part of the party, this was needed to ensure that all cookies were "baked", everyone came with a minimum number of cookies, everyone had an ugly Christmas sweater and most importantly, no kids or husbands came to the party! This was a Cooke Exchange Party, but it also was a fun night for just the ladies!

This was our first attempt at such a party and is now going to be an annual tradition. Including us (the two hostesses), we had a dozen people at the party with nearly 40 dozen cookies plus plenty of appetizers and drinks. The picture isn't the greatest but here is the table with all of the cookies the ladies brought to the party!

We also had prizes for 3 categories which was the Best Looking Cookie, Most Creative Recipe and the Ugliest Christmas Sweater. We obtained a copy of each recipe ahead of time, made copies and handed them out at the party so everyone went home with a recipe of all of the cookies at the party. And this allowed everyone to vote for the "Most Creative Recipe". I should have taken pictures of the winners of each category, especially the "ugliest sweater". It may be too late for that, but I do have pictures of the prizes that I made for the party. Each prize was made out of vinyl and I think turned out great! The Red Vinyl sign is made out of tile, the Subway Art Sign was a Goodwill frame that I re-painted, both of which I will post a separate blog on how I made them in more detail!

I wrapped up all of the "prizes", we placed them under the Christmas tree and the winners unwrapped their presents to reveal their prize! I hope everyone had a lot of fun and I think, come next year, there will be very little things I would want to change when it comes time to prepare for our "2nd Annual Cookie Exchange Party"!

Santa Charger Plate

Today I finished my first attempt on a very popular item - Charger Plates.  A fellow Craft Blogger graciously shared her ginger bread cookie files and the snowflakes I had found previously online for a different project.  With my Charger plate I decided to use 3 different colors of vinyl  and used outdoor vinyl as this plate will need to be washed on occasion. 

Below is my final design:

It was a little tricky to ensure the letters were straight as the font itself is meant to show the letters crooked.  The gingerbread cookies has copper vinyl, the lettering is red and the snowflakes are white.  I have several really nice designs and ideas that I am planning on using for more Charger plates; however, I need to make a quick shopping trip to pick up some silver plates as I think that will look the best for the ideas that I have.  This was a fun project that really changes the appearance of an otherwise, boring display plate!  Check back soon for more Charger plates!