Countdown to Christmas: Part Two

It’s the 25th, which means that once again it’s time for Countdown to Christmas. This year I’m trying to knock out as many things as I can before December rolls around so the holidays will be a little more peaceful. Don’t run away! I know it’s hard to think about Christmas in February, but I’m hoping that a little preparation now will make life a lot more pleasant later.

So here are a couple of things I’m working on right now. Very simple! Nothing too crazy or overwhelming.

Gift Wrapping

I love this packaging by Sharilyn at lovelydesign. So simple yet festive. She’s also designed really beautiful gift tags to accompany the packages. You can download those here.

There’s a Dick Blick by Tim’s office that sells brown kraft paper. Red wrapping paper is here. Or maybe I can pick some up at Target. Red seems like a year-round kind of color. For the tags, Sharilyn recommends Strathmore Acrylic linen canvas. Dick Blick has that, too. The paper is heavy, but she says you can get great results with a regular printer. Sharilyn recommends manually feeding the sheets through the printer one at a time.

I’m okay on red ribbons, but I’ll pop into JoAnn Fabrics for some white ribbons in various widths. And then I’ll tuck it all away until I’m ready to start wrapping. I think a mound of presents wrapped like this would look amazing under the tree.

Bath Fizzies

I clipped this Bath Fizzies how-to out of Martha Stewart Living years ago, but I’ve never managed to make them because a couple of the materials require a little extra effort to find. And of course I never have time to track them down in December. You need citric acid, which is sold at wine supply stores like the Northern Brewer in St. Paul, and a silicone ice-cube tray. Which was surprisingly hard to find, so I’m just ordering one online. I’ll thank myself later if I round up the jars and vellum tags now. Don’t the fizzies look like homemade marshmallows? I think these would be a great gift for friends.

• Have you ever made your own postage stamps? Lily drew a Christmas tree last year that would make a cute stamp. Or maybe ours will feature Gunther (our golden retriever).
• Here’s a DIY CD sleeve tutorial at Marta Writes if you’d like to give a merry mix CD or a bunch of photos on a CD as gifts.
• These Snowglobe Soaps could be fun gifts for the kids to make if I can find toys cute and small enough to fit inside ice-cube sized soaps.

So just a few ideas to work on this month. Please share anything you do early on to make Christmas more sane for yourself and your family.

We have a half-day of school and I’m subbing in the Early Childhood classroom this morning, so I’m off. I’m thinking a trip to the bookstore with the kids this afternoon would be nice. I have to pick up a copy of The Black Dahlia for next month’s book club meeting. I hear it’s pretty dark.