Day Three Hundred Fifty Seven: Pretty Recycling

On Saturday I'm celebrating the second birthday of a very sweet little girl.  I decided to use Martha's Recycled Bows to top her gift.  To start, you'll need one page per bow.  It works best if the page is mostly one color.

First cut the page lengthwise into nine 3/4-inch-thick strips of heights shown:  three at 11 inches, three at 10 inches, two at 9 inches and one at 3 1/2 inches.

Twist each strip to form loops at both ends.  Make a circle out of the smallest.  Secure the ends with a piece of double-sided tape. 

Layer and stick, starting with the longest strips.  End with the circle in the center.

 It's sweet....if slightly lopsided.  Thank goodness she is like most two-year olds and unlikely to notice.

Day Three Hundred Fifty Three: Happy Birthday Favors

As part of the favors for my birthday dinner, I spent the morning of my birthday making one of Martha's favorite chocolate chip cookies: Jacques Torres's Secret Chocolate Chip Cookies.  Since the recipe makes about 10,0000  100 cookies, it was no small task.  Even though I've made them before, I still love these cookies. I think I might have cooked a few batches a couple minutes long, but hey--a girl is sometimes too knee-deep in Downton Abbey to notice a timer chime.

I use an ice-cream scoop to make sure all the cookies are exactly the same size:

Once the cookies cooled, I put them in the favor boxes with the chocolate nut clusters, (minus the jam-filled muffin coffeecakes), along with a few other goodies. 

I tied them up with bakers string and topped the whole thing off with my personalized favor tag.

Even though my husband made fun of me for making them, I know several guests enjoyed them on the car ride home.

Happy Birthday to me.

Day Three Hundred Forty Six: Personalized Gift Tags

Friday is my birthday and my husband has set up a little dinner with a few friends.  Like us, they all have children and I know it is a sacrifice of time and money to celebrate with me.  As a thank-you, I'm going to make each of them a little basket of goodies to enjoy after the party.  

I'll be showing you what I make for the snacks later in the week, but I started last week by making personalized tags for each gift.  I used Martha's clip art from a wedding favor idea and had a personalized stamp made.  It has a vintage car on the top and says "Snacks for the Road" underneath.  

I stamped the design on a 4-inch square card stock.  In pink.  Because it's all about me.

They are really too cute.  I can't wait to attach them to the gift boxes.

Day Two Hundred Sixty: Clever Bottle Wrap

Last week was Thanksgiving and I had the good fortune of going to someone else's house for dinner.  Being a good dinner guest, I brought the obligatory bottle of wine.  I actually wanted to bring more than one bottle so I used Martha's Bottle Wrap idea to wrap them together in one adorable package.

Seriously? How cute is this?

Just take a piece of fabric and lay two bottles on their sides, bottoms facing each other.  Roll them both up in the fabric and tie at the top.  Decorate them with a couple pinecones you nicked from your friend Sybil's yard and you have a unique presentation of a not-so-unique gift.

Day Two Hundred Fifty-Seven: It's a (Translucent) Wrap

I celebrated the birthday of a good friend on Monday.  I wanted to do something special in the wrapping-department so I decided to try Martha's Translucent Wrapping Paper.  Start by wrapping a present in brightly-colored wrapping paper.  Next, take a piece of tissue or glassine and make random folds in the paper like so:

Then wrap the present in the folded tissue to create something chic and interesting.  These are Martha's colorful gifts:

Gorgeous, aren't they?



This sad one is mine:

:yawn:

Not quite the pretty product I was expecting.  Luckily, the present inside was pretty cute.
:excellent gift-shopper: