Sunday, December 30, 2012

Wishing EVERYONE a VERY Happy New Year!!

Hey there everybody!! Are you all surviving all of the holiday happenings!? I know that my family certainly had a busy but VERY fun and enjoyable Christmas!! We had our get together with my side of the family the weekend before Christmas which was a blast! Kind of quiet compared to years past but it was just as much fun as it always is and hey the people that came are the people that you want around in your life right!? The people that were TOO busy to make time or what not... well your loss!! We had a BLAST!

This was the first year that we have been home for Christmas eve, in hopes of starting some of our own family holiday traditions!! We went out for a family dinner and came home to relax and of course SANTA had to come visit our little peanut! That was the highlight of the holiday for me, seeing her come out Christmas morning to presents under the tree and getting so excited! 

We also then went to my husband's sides Christmas get together. From my understanding it was the first time in quite some time that they had got together on his dad's side for the holiday so that was pretty cool to see and a fun time! Unfortunately by the time we went to that, I think we were all feeling pretty darn tired!!  That's the problem with the holiday season, all the rush rush rush before, the getting ready, shopping, cooking, parties wears you out but still it is SO very enjoyable to spend time with family!

Now on to the New Year!! I know personally I have a few resolutions that I would like to stick to... I got a Zumba game for the Xbox for Christmas so I know that I would like to have a resolution to work out at least 3 times a week for a little bit each time, as well as I am going to try to cut back on POP!!! I drink way way way too much pop (pepsi to be exact!) Several years ago I made it my resolution to cut pop out entirely after a few weeks of WICKED headaches and feeling pretty darn crappy I was down to drinking none, I don't know that I'm going quite to that extreme this time, but I am definitely going to try to cut down on it!  

Mama Made Gifts is also making a resolution... to keep you guys updated more often, make more blog posts, update my shop more often and keep products new and fresh!

Speaking of which, now that we have officially hit the winter solstice (do the days seem any longer to you!?!) I am going to start adding some new knit items to my shop that don't seem quite so wintery! That's not to say you can't still order hats, mittens, scarves, what have you but I just think it's time to add some more light weight things as well. My lacy infinity scarf was the start of this. You can view it in my shop here:

I also plan on making baby blankets as well as several other ideas that I have found patterns for, please keep checking back for updates!  I plan to bring back more graphic design items as well!! I have kind of been on a little break from the graphic items due to a lack of creativity as well as really wanting to knit, but now the itch to do some design work on the computer is starting to come back so expect to see some new graphic items as well!!

Well I think I have blabbed on enough here, the main point to this post was to a.) update you since I hadn't made a post since the beginning of December and b.) to wish you all a VERY Happy New Year!! Please have fun and celebrate but be careful and be responsible!! Keep checking back for more updates, new items and a CLEAN look to my shop!!

Until next post!

Mama

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Monday, December 3, 2012

Blogging blank-out!

Hey everyone!! I know it has been quite some time since I posted, I kept saying that I would post and then just never got to it, plus although I have had a lot going on, I just haven't really had anything to blog to you guys about!!

I hope everyone is having a GREAT holiday season!! I know that Thanksgiving at our house was a lot of fun! Lots of great company and good food!! Lets just say that I won't feel the need to eat turkey for quite some time now! Yikes!! I love having our families over to our house for Thanksgiving but oh my goodness I get tired of the leftovers in just a very few days!! There are only so many meals you can eat turkey in a row!

With that said, onward to Christmas!! The weekend after Thanksgiving we got our Christmas decorations out! I absolutely LOVE decorating for Christmas!! The tree is up and looks so pretty, lights spread around here and there stockings hung, and my fabulous husband even put lights up outside this year!

The weekend before Thanksgiving, I did a holiday craft show with my mom! She too has an Etsy shop W&W Crafts! My dad cuts out the wood crafts and my mom paints them
http://www.etsy.com/shop/SMW1953
Anyway like I was saying, we did a holiday craft show together which went pretty well short of us almost freezing to death (they had the air on!!) My mom sold quite a few crafts which was exciting and I found out that my knit headbands are a big hit!! I also sold my first ruffle scarf which was exciting!


Well for now, I have several orders that I need to get off to the post office and seeing how it's a decent day here today temperature wise I think I will head out and get something accomplished!! I will try to post again soon with some product and shop updates!! 

Talk with you all soon!
-Mama
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Thursday, October 4, 2012

Ideas for having an absolutely SPOOKTACULAR Halloween Party!!





Good afternoon everyone! Let me just first start off by saying that I LOVE Halloween!! In fact, I really love the Fall season!! Don't get me wrong, I am definitely a Summer person as I don't like being cold, and don't enjoy driving in the Winter months, but at the same time I don't enjoy being overly hot either (call me picky lol) and I LOVE the cool crisp air that comes with fall, the gorgeous colors of the leaves on the trees and 2 of my favorite holidays happen in the Fall months!

With that being said, back to Halloween! It is such a fun cooky holiday! I love carving pumpkins, especially now that we have a little girl of our own to help carve them and she gets such a kick out of things like that. I love all the creepy fun decorations and costumes, all in all it's just such a fun crazy holiday to get into! And a trip to target with my mom recently proved that stores are trying to get as many Halloween decorations out and make as big of a deal over this holiday as they do over Christmas!

That's one reason why when the Handmade Circle team of Etsy decided to have a SPOOKTACULAR Halloween sale I jumped all over it! That's right, through this Sunday,  October 7, the Handmade Circle Team is celebrating Halloween with our HMC Spooktacular Sale. Just use coupon code HMCSPOOKY for discounts from 5% to 30% in any of the participating shops!

Another part of celebrating Halloween for us other than carving pumpkins and taking our little girl out trick-or-treating is going to a Halloween party with a bunch of friends! It has always been a good time! We all bring tasty snacks to share, dress up and just act goofy. Of course there is a costume contest which can get quite competitive! This year however the couple that normally hosts the party are not, so I'm not entirely sure what the plan for Halloween party going will be. And if we weren't having a bonfire just a few weeks before I would consider hosting the party ourselves!! Even if we aren't hosting the party I love planning parties and all the great ideas, fun foods and such that go along with it so I went in search of some different fun ideas for Halloween party themes, activities, decorations and snacks and the following is what I found!

Such a cute creative idea for guests drinks!

Yum!! Halloween Themed Cake Pops!
No get together with our friends and family is complete without a game of beanbag toss, Halloween bags are prefect!
 I also checked in with the lovely ladies of the Handmade Circle team for ideas for parties and here are some of the ideas that they came up with!!


 
Holly Burke Westmoreland of Holly's Homemade Goodies had several great suggestions!
Where do I begin...
1. Purchase cheap candles from the dollar store (any color) and wrap decorative Halloween paper (found at Michael's or Hobby Lobby) around them securing with glue. You can dress up with ribbon, sequins, or prefabricated spider webs.
2. Decorate your food table with cheap orange, black or purple fabric purchased from a fabric store. Put you Christmas lights underneath to add ambiance to your table.
3. Instead of giving out candy, I purchase, through out the year, discounted stickers, pencils, small crafts, and what not from craft stores. I make up small bags with these goodies to give out. You can also use this same idea for goody bags to give the children at your Halloween party.
4.Take surgical gloves and fill with the Halloween punch you will be serving and freeze. Once frozen, peel off gloves and put your frozen hands in your punch bowl. Kids love them!
Sharon Morgan of ArtisticSoul Designs had a fun idea for little hands!
Something that's always a hit with kids is a mystery box. Put something gooey, slimy or just baffling inside and have everyone guess what it is. Cooked spaghetti noodles tossed with oil or peeled grapes are especially creepy!
Kate Brooks of Pieces of Home Mosaics also had several great ideas for little Halloween party guests!
I host a Preschool Halloween party every year because of my preschool! We all dress up in our custumes and head outside. Our games are so much fun! Pumpkin bowling, a feely tub filled with black and white rice with toy bugs & halloween rings. We get out the parachute. We have another feely tub with black beans, white beans, glitter and halloween toys. We bring the hippty hop balls, tunnel, jumping sacks, & balls. We also have a bean bag toss game & dancing streamers. The parents bring treats, I read a halloween book to the kids. And the grand end of our party is picking our own pumpkin from the pumpkin patch!
 Ashley Noelle Mabe of Brenny's Bibbies had a fun game idea that would be great for kids but could be just as fun for adults as well!
One game that kids seem to love is pumpkin bowling. Take six (or the full ten) empty two liter bottles and decorate them with monster/witch/ghosts faces. Place a few rocks or sand in the bottom of the bottles to give them a little bit of weight. Use a plastic pumpkin or even an orange ball with a jack o' lantern face drawn on to bowl over the pins. We've done this at fall festivals and craft fairs, the kids love it.
Jessica Grauert Croft of The Prismatic Peacock suggested adding some incentive to your costume parties!
Costume parties are so much fun, and there is more incentive to dress up when you offer prizes for different categories such as: best couple, scariest, funniest, most original, etc. We attend a Halloween party with the same group of friends every year, and it's always such a good time. People take the costume contest very seriously and we have had some very creative and hilarious winners! Make sure you have your camera charged before the party!
Shannon Rose of A Moment in Paradise had a unique Halloween party theme idea!
I thought this sounded like a fun themed Halloween party: Hellidays. This is such a fun adult Halloween party idea! If you can think of a holiday, you can spook it up. Dead Easter bunnies, evil Santas, cannibal Thanksgiving dinners.. it would be fun to see what your guests came up with

So I just wanted to say thanks to all of you HMC girls for the GREAT ideas for a SPOOKTACULAR Halloween Party!

Be sure to stop by and check out all the participating shops!! Use coupon code HMCSPOOKY for the sale discount!

Augie and Lola Baby Boutique www.etsy.com/shop/augieandlola
Monday's Child Primitaves www.etsy.com/shop/MondaysChildPrims


 
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Wednesday, October 3, 2012

It's Been A While!





Hey everyone! Thought it was about time that I checked in with everyone again! It's been quite a while since my last blog post! Not only have I had sort of a blogger's block but we have had some busy weekends and happenings going on lately! Not to mention I have been working my little butt off starting to add some knitted items to my shop!

That's right! Mama Made Gifts is branching out in another direction to add more items to my shop! My mom had purchased me a knitting loom quite a while ago and I had started knitting a scarf on it, but knitting being more of a fall or winter hobby to me I had put it away and not thought about it for a while. Well as we all know, the cooler weather is fast approaching and one morning while I was sitting in the living room enjoying the crisp air filtering through our windows and sipping on an amazing cup of coffee I decided to get that loom out and finish the scarf that I had started earlier in the summer months! After I finished that, I decided to check out some other patterns that could be completed on the knitting looms and was quite surprised that you can create nearly anything!!

This led to me creating my 1st hat for my daughter!! I was bold and took on a pattern with earflaps and drawstrings it went really well! I was even feeling confident enough to add some ornamentation by adding a pom-pom on top and an I-cord bow! I absolutely adore how it turned out and our daughter has gotten quite a few compliments on it!

My success in this hat was enough encouragement to create a small ear flap hat with bear ears listed here in my shop
https://www.etsy.com/listing/110380313/hand-knitted-newborn-to-3-month-soft
also available in this listing for toddlers and in brighter colors
https://www.etsy.com/listing/111109064/hand-knitted-infant-toddler-bear-hat
My cousin is expecting in December and has choose not to find out the gender so I wanted to make a hat for her little one that would be fitting for a little boy or girl!

After that hat I went on to making myself a scarf cowl, I haven't yet decided if I actually like it yet, which is why I haven't listed one on etsy yet. I think it may need some perfecting before I list it.
After that it was gloves, I have created fingerless gloves with a covered thumb or fingerless gloves without a covered thumb, as well as infant mittens!

So as you can tell I am on a knitting kick!! I will be adding a listing for the infant mittens as well as the fingerless uncovered thumb gloves! Of course I still have all my graphic listings, just thought I would add more to my shop to have a variety of items!

I really enjoy knitting, A LOT to the point that it is actually really kind of relaxing for me! Plus as I stated before the cooler weather is coming quickly and who doesn't want to be prepared with a nice warm fuzzy hat, scarf, gloves or more!!

All my hats can be made in a range of sizes! From newborn to adult!

Check back later today for my Handmade Circle Spooktacular Halloween Sale Blog Post about ideas for hosting a SPOOKTACULAR Halloween Party!!

-Mama



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Tuesday, September 4, 2012

Ugh! Sick...Sick...Sick!!


Hey everyone!! Thank goodness that I am not having to make a speech to you guys or actually use my voice because quite honestly I don't have much of one!! This past weekend, my little family had a GREAT labor day weekend up at my parent's place on the lake but unfortunately we've all ended up with a cold!!! And OH MY GOSH apparently it has been a while since I had a cold because this one is certainly kicking my BUTT! Anyway enough with my complaining, and on to my post!!

I hope everyone else had a wonderful labor day weekend! It was so good to have a long weekend with the fam but labor day to me always means the end of summer. I am such a summer person... let me rephrase that... I absolutely LOVE fall too, I just dread what comes after the fall!! I hate winter! I dislike being cold more than anything and I hate driving in snow, I am a big baby and turn into somewhat of a grandma when I have to drive in winter conditions!

I am still working on regaining control over my shop and adding more of the digital file listings to it but so far I have had 3 orders that were printable/digital orders and I have to say that I love doing those!! I have absolutely NO problem doing orders that I have to print and ship but it is so so so nice to be able to spend a bit of time personalizing or making a custom order and not having to worry about printing it and shipping it, plus I love that the customer gets their order almost immediately!!


I just "shipped" a print it yourself order for baby shower games and diaper raffle tickets that were a custom order she wanted to have made to match her already purchased invitations here is what I came up with and I'm pretty proud of them!!

I also made the first of more to come Halloween Party invitations! I am going to be part of the Handmade Circle Halloween Spooktacular sale coming up so I am trying to add some fall and holiday items!!
I absolutely love it myself!! I am going to create more Halloween critters and more products so stay tuned!! Also check back in for more details on the upcoming sale!!

Well if I intend on beating this darn cold that I have acquired I better get some rest! I am going to work on updating my shop some more I think and will check back in soon!! Oh and did I mention tomorrow is already Wednesday!!! Happy mid-week to all!!!
-Mama
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Thursday, August 30, 2012

Cha cha cha changes!!...

Hey everyone I know it has been quite a little while since I posted last time been a little busy with other things as well as just plain not really being in a blogging mood! But hopefully some changes I am planning on making to my shop will help get my motivation back!
Anyway... After seeing the title of this post and me mentioning shop changes you may by now be wondering what kind of changes is she talking about... Well I will answer you!
Mama made gifts will be turning into more of a digital file print it yourself type of shop. I enjoy making printed products it has just gotten too costly what with the price of ink and other materials so I have decided in order to keep my shop open I am going to try my hand at offering mainly digital files! Now does this mean I won't take print orders and ship them still?... Absolutely not! I am still more than happy to take printed order requests they will just be slightly higher in price as opposed to the digital file orders. I will also be changing my turn around time on such printed orders being that I am not always able to get items printed and shipped in under 2 days!
So my plan for today as I can between playing with our peanut and trying to do some housework is to try to get my shop updated and everything back in order and under control!
In other non shop related news we had a great time on vacation the race was a blast and it was a great time with family! So hard to leave our peanut for that time though! Now we are looking forward to a fun family labor day weekend at the lake! Oh did I mention that it's HOT!! Holy cow!!! We had some almost fall like weather the past few weeks which was nice and now mother nature has snapped back the other way and is hot!! Phew! I worked up a sweat just walking to the mailbox!!
Well I am off to try to regain order of my shop! Check Facebook for more news and updates and I will be sure to post again soon!!
- Mama
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Wednesday, July 18, 2012

More HMC in July promotion!

Happy Wednesday to everyone!! We made it through the day and we can nearly see the weekend!! Phew!! First of all I would just like to share how excited I am about the recent sales that I've had!! :) I've had several sales in a row *knock on wood* I am absolutely LOVING the sales fairy visiting my shop!! Also I had my first over seas sale!! That's pretty exciting too!! My sale that I got from Australia was a custom order for a baby shower game and she asked for a pirate theme, I had thought about creating pirate themed items and just hadn't done it yet so this order pushed me to do it and I'm glad that I did!! I have a great new image option for future orders!!

This is the final product! A personalized pirate themed baby shower game!!

The pirate ship!


 Okay on to the HMC Christmas in July sale promotion! I said in my post yesterday that in my upcoming posts I will be picking 5 shops each post to feature so here we go for today!





Paper Pastiche

There you have it!! My choices of 5 shops to promote today and of course as always please visit my shop as well at
www.etsy.com/shops/mamamadegifts

I am off to update and try to organize my shop! Until tomorrow!! And don't forget, tomorrow is Thank-You THURSDAY at Mama Made Gifts!! Place an order tomorrow and get a gift certificate for 5 dollars off of your next purchase!

-Mama
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