Hi everyone! Bet you thought I fell into a hole somewhere. Nah, just job hunting now that I’m done with school. Anyone want to hire me? :) Anyway, I attended the San Francisco International Gift Fair last Saturday, and I ran across these flower-covered paper lanterns at the zappobz booth. I begged to take a picture so you can see them. I still like mine best, but I thought the bright colors were fun too. By the way, my favorite booth at the fair was roost. Love, love, love their stuff.

I planned to make a flower-covered paper lantern for months. Not until I found a white poinsettia garland at a Michael’s after-Christmas clearance did it become a reality. Normally, I’m not a fan of fake flowers, but I think this is a great way to use them. I had some leftover pom-pom fringe, so I festooned the second lantern with pom poms. Now I can’t decide which one I like best. I bought these white 12-inch paper lanterns at Ikea years ago. Raise your hand if you hate the cheap white paper lanterns that Ikea and World Market sell now. ME TOO.

Paper lanterns, two ways: flowers and pom poms

Supplies and tools

• white paper lantern and cord kit (try this one or this one)
• hot glue gun and glue
• fake flowers
• scissors
• pom-pom fringe
• compact fluorescent light bulb

Flower-covered lantern:

1. Start by removing the flowers from the garland, remove the plastic pieces, and tear the petals apart (some are hot glued together).

2. Then cut the pom poms off the fringe. You can also buy loose pom poms, but I liked these off-white ones better than the white ones they sell loose.

3. Hot glue the flowers and pom-pom centers onto the lantern. Glue them so they overlap to cover the entire paper surface. The garland I used provided just enough flowers for one 12-inch paper lantern. This one required two 4-foot spools of pom-pom fringe.

4. Insert the cord kit and hang from the ceiling. If you use a compact fluorescent light bulb, you’ll never have to worry about the hot glue melting.

Pom-pom lantern:

1. Apply a thin line of hot glue along the paper lantern’s ridges, a few inches at a time. Adhere the fringe to the glue, then repeat. DO NOT follow the ridge all the way around because the frame is constructed as a spiral, so your ends will never meet. So, when you get six or so inches from the end, start directing the line to connect to where you started. I spaced each line of pom poms six lines apart. This one required three 4-foot spools of pom-pom fringe.

2. Insert the cord kit and hang from the ceiling.

I just wanted to thank SunRun for the opportunity to be a judge this year’s Customer Holiday Lights Contest. Congratulations to the winners! Judging the contest was fun, and I’m happy to promote the use of solar energy anytime.

Darla and Liz, this photo is for you. :) This is one of the boy angel Christmas ornaments that my great grandmother made for the males in the family. Happy Christmas Eve to you all!

Don’t you just love Christmas lights? As an apartment dweller, decking the yard with lights isn’t an option, so instead my living room is almost as bright as day in the evening with all the strings of lights. They’re the next best thing to sitting beside a flickering fireplace. Check out all the new growth on my little potted Christmas tree. It’s growing fast! The angel on the top of the tree was tatted by my great grandmother—the same one who made these doilies. She made everyone in the family either a boy or girl angel. My father insisted his angel needed pants, so she created the pattern just for him. Have a very Merry Christmas everyone!

Here’s a last-minute idea for us last-minute gift wrappers. I felt guilty about discarding those round, sturdy cardboard canisters that hold nuts, cocoa, and other foods. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think they can be recycled (aluminum + cardboard?). But they definitely can be reused! Here, I covered them in gift wrap and tied on ribbon—and they can be reused year after year to hold anything from cookies to socks. Or you could wrap them in everyday decorative paper and use them as pencil holders or storage containers. I just thought they were too cute to toss. (The blue and green is for you, Carolyn!)

Reusable wrapped gift canisters

Supplies and tools

• wrapping paper
• scissors
• glue (I used rubber cement)
• ruler & pencil
• round cardboard food canisters
• clear cellophane tape
• ribbon
• paper towel

1. Clean out the empty canisters with a dry paper towel. Measure the height of the cardboard portion of the canister. (You will not cover the metal part of the can.)

2. Cut a piece of wrapping paper that height, roll it around the can, and trim to fit—leaving a couple inches of overlap.

3. Apply glue to one end of the paper, then stick it to the canister. Pull the paper tight as you wrap it around, then apply glue to the other end of the paper and press down. If you wish, you can apply glue to more than just the ends.

4. Reattach the lid and tie a bow around the package. For an awesome video tutorial on how to tie ribbon to packages Hollywood style (without knots) click here. Just tape the ribbon to the bottom of round packages first—it makes the process so much easier. By the way, thinner ribbon looks better and is easier to tie around small round packages.

5. Adjust the ribbon and cut ends as desired.

6. Tape the other side of the ribbon to the bottom as well.

7. You’re all done!

I could hardly wait to show you this Popsicle stick craft! These snowflakes are fun, easy, and so inexpensive to make. The smallest snowflake is 12 inches across; the largest is 24 inches. I had some rhinestones left over from my Christmas tree advent calendar, so I glued some at the tips of each white snowflake. You could also coat them in glitter or fake snow. And why stop with snowflakes? You could make stars, wreaths, or Christmas trees decked with lightweight ornaments. Hang them in your window, over a door instead of a wreath, or from the ceiling.

Giant craft stick snowflakes

Supplies and tools

• craft sticks
• protractor
• hot glue gun and glue
• fishing line
• clear cellophane tape
• 3/8- to 1/2-inch-wide holiday ribbon
• red and white paint (I used Benjamin Moore Aura Steam [AF-15] and Caliente [AF-290])
• round 12mm rhinestones
• scissors
• double-stick foam tape
• small paintbrush
• drop cloth or newspaper

All my snowflakes are based on three basic patterns, which I will call star, hexagon, and rotated hexagon.

The star

1. Start by gluing six craft sticks in an asterisk shape at 30 degree angles. Use a protractor to make sure your angles are accurate.

2. Then add the points to the star.

3. Finally, depending on the pattern, add the final craft sticks to complete the snowflake.

The hexagon

1A. Start by gluing six craft sticks in an asterisk shape at 30 degree angles. Use a protractor to make sure your angles are accurate.

1B. For the mini hexagon, start with three craft sticks instead of six.

2. Add more sticks to expand the lengths.

3. Glue six sticks in a hexagon shape, then glue each point of the hexagon to your asterisk shape.

4. Finally, depending on the pattern, add the final craft sticks to complete the snowflake.

The rotated hexagon

1. Start by gluing six craft sticks in an asterisk shape at 30 degree angles. Use a protractor to make sure your angles are accurate.

2. Glue six sticks in a hexagon shape, then glue the middle of each side of the hexagon to your asterisk shape.

3. Finally, add the final craft sticks to complete the snowflake.

1. Using a small paintbrush, paint two coats of paint on each side, including the edges. I recommend spray paint instead because it’s easier and faster, but severe weather prohibited spray paint in my case. Let dry.

2. Glue rhinestones onto the tips of the snowflakes. Or glue on glitter or fake snow. Let dry/cool.

3. To hang them in the window, tie fishing line to each snowflake. Tape the fishing line to the top of the window frame with clear cellophane tape.

4. To hang them on the wall, tie a small ribbon bow to the snowflake, then tie a longer piece of ribbon to the back of the bow. Attach the long ribbon with double-stick foam tape at the very top of the wall.

I had a box of 1000 craft sticks and no idea what to do with them. I wasn’t about to start building 1980s Popsicle stick jewelry boxes. I eventually came up with some Christmas ideas. This advent calendar is my first craft stick project. I’ll post my other ideas next week. The advent calendar is easy but time consuming. I suggest you enlist some helpers to fold the “origami” boxes and tie ribbons and string. Technically, the boxes aren’t origami because they involve a few cuts, but they are assembled without tape or glue. Each box holds a piece of chocolate. The beauty is, you don’t have to remove the ribbon to open each box, so the calendar is reusable.

Craft stick advent calendar with “origami” boxes

Supplies and tools

• 24 craft sticks
• spray primer and spray paint (or any craft paint)
• hot glue gun and glue
• 25 sheets of letter size paper (or 13 sheets of 12×12 paper)
• box template (see #4 below)
• scissors
• 2 spools of 1/4-inch red grosgrain ribbon ( $1 each at Jo-Ann)
• 1 spool of red baker’s twine
• number stickers (I used three packages of Colorbök “Marshmallow Wacky” alphabet stickers from Jo-Ann)
• 9 round 12mm rhinestones
• thick red Sharpie marker
• double-sided foam tape
• candy

1. Glue craft sticks together end-to-end, overlapping about 1/2-inch in the following lengths: 6, 5, 4, 3, and 2. A trick to keeping each of them straight is to turn them sideways against the table while the glue cools. Then glue four sticks together in the center in a star shape.

2. Glue the “branches” of graduating lengths at each intersection along the longest strip of craft sticks, then glue the star to the top.

3. Paint the tree and star any color you want. (If you plan to paint the star a different color than the tree, it’s easier to paint the star before gluing it to the tree.) Hot glue rhinestones to each tip and center of the star.

4. For the boxes, you will need 50 4×4-inch sheets of paper with diagonal lines drawn through the center. Either use a ruler to measure and draw the lines yourself, or download and print this template onto 25 sheets of letter size paper. (Part of the lines on the template are outside of the printable area. Don’t worry about this. It was necessary to save you two extra cuts on each sheet.) Cut along the solid lines of the template. I used Hammermill 32 lb. color laser gloss paper because it’s what I had on hand. I recommend it because it’s a good weight, durable, and resists fingerprints.

5. Fold each of the four corners into the center and open back up again.

6. Then fold each corner diagonally so the tip touches the center of the opposite fold, then open back up again.

7. Cut (as shown) along four of the folds, stopping at the center square.

8. Fold two opposites sides into the center again (as shown).

9. Fold again along previous folds to form two sides of the box (as shown).

10. Tuck the top and bottom pieces over and inside the box.

11. This is either the top or bottom of your box. Repeat steps 5-10 for each box top/bottom (50 times). Told you this was time consuming.

12. Slide one box bottom/top into the other. You’ll need to pinch in the sides the first time to make it fit.

13. Each box will look like this when you are done.

14. I couldn’t find any packages of just number stickers, so I bought packages of alphabet/number stickers. Three packets gave me just enough numbers (I was one short “1″ sticker but I changed an “I” into a “1.” I couldn’t find red stickers, so I bought white ones and colored them red with a Sharpie marker. Color your stickers and let dry before peeling and sticking them on the boxes.

15. Tie a bunch of little nooses out of the red twine, then tie one noose to each box with a red ribbon bow.

16. Apply a small dot of hot glue under the knot of the bow and the string. This will keep the bow and string in place.

17. Hang each box by the twine noose.

18. Place candy inside each box. Dove Promises (one of my favorites) fit nicely.

19. Hang the boxes on the Christmas tree. Because there are an odd number of boxes and an even number of spaces, you’ll have to choose one branch that has one fewer boxes on it than the other.

20. Stick the tree to your wall with a small piece of double-sided foam tape at the top and bottom of the tree.

I know: Monica, you need to get your seasons straight, right? I’m celebrating Spring in November because I couldn’t wait four months to share these beauties. Besides, red and green makes it almost Christmasy. I’m sure you recognize this window that used to be a mirror. I decided I had too many mirrors in my apartment and not enough art. And one can never have too much white paint, I say. The botanical illustrations are from Köhler’s Medizinal-Pflanzen, a four-volume German book published in 1887. Botanicus.org scanned the nearly 300 drawings and made them available to download for free! © 1995-2009 Missouri Botanical Garden.

Window frame and (free!) botanical illustrations

1. Choose your desired botanical images and download them here (or buy prints here). I chose illustrations that have red in them because they went with my decor, but there are many gorgeous illustrations in a rainbow of colors as well.

2. Open your downloaded illustrations in a photo-editing software program (such as Photoshop) to resize and/or crop the images to fit your picture frames.

3. If you have a high quality printer, print your images. If not, save your files onto a flash drive or CD and take them to a photocopying service. I paid $1.78 for each 11×17-inch print at FedEx Office. Use a paper trimmer to trim to size.

4. Frame each print and hang them on the wall. Easy peasy.

For a step-by-step tutorial on painting and hanging a window frame, click here.

Remember my tank top totes from a few weeks ago? Well, I just had to share this tip. The piece I cut off the bottom of the one of the tank tops made a perfect—and super comfortable—headband. My friend Rhean did a beautiful job modeling it for me. So, save your scraps. Mine is about four inches wide, but nearly any width works. Skinnier = headband; wider = head wrap. They’re ideal for pulling your hair back to wash your face or apply make-up too.

No-sew tank top headband

Supplies and tools

• tank top (preferably a stretchy one)
• rotary cutter
• self-healing mat
• metal ruler
• scissors

1. If you made a gathered tank top tote bag, use the scrap piece you cut off the bottom. If you didn’t make a tote bag, and you just want to repurpose an old tank top, cut 4-inch (or other desired width) strips across the body of the tank.

2. Your original cut may be a bit jagged like mine, so measure and cut a smooth, straight line with a rotary cutter.

3. Then just twist into a figure 8 at the seams and double it over like a rubber band (to wrap your head twice). Smooth the top part out and wrap it around your head, placing the crossed-over seams at the base of your neck.