So... I'm participating in this... blog event? Whatever it is. We are given some ideas every day for 12 days. And I'm not too impressed... Yes, I'm a grumpy badger and I am going to be totally honest about it. No one reads my blog anyway.
Also, my ideal Yule tree is filled with antique-style ornaments and has a star on top. That's the way my mother had it. The ornaments should be rather small, fit in the hand, and not be "rustic". Usually "rustic" means haphazard, clumsy, and looking like a toddler put it together using too much glue. I HATE the "make a cute ornament from an antique cake mold by gluing stuff on it!". I don't like ornaments made of little sticks, especially if they are then painted, and hung on the tree on a hairy piece of sisal string. There will be no sisal, hemp, jute, or burlap in my tree!
I don't mind handmade things, or kitschy - to a point. It should be well-made and look nice. Salt dough is fine, as well as pine cones.
I kind of like these pine cone gnomes.
I could also imagine crocheted snowflakes in my tree, though they should be made of a rather fine thread and stiffened, maybe even glittered.
Another type of ornament I can see myself making is some sort of shadow box ornament with old snuff boxes (I mean the plastic ones, from Sweden. My husband snuffs, and there are always tons of those round boxes around. They might make nice ornaments, painted and decorated.)
Now, when it comes to gift ideas... you really need to just get gifts to people who you know well enough to have an idea of what they want for gifts.
Or if not, you know them well enough to give them a questionnaire to fill out that will help you. (You know, like a "gift exchange questionnaire" or one of those you give to kids where they can write their favorite color, and other such things, and where you write down their sizes and preferences and dislikes, etc.)
Keep an ear open during the year and write down things you have heard, like when they express they like something or wish they had something.
But, here's one Pinterest board about gift ideas, and here's one about stocking stuffers. I'm sure you'll get some ideas. (But, just in case, keep the receipts if the gift receiver wants to exchange the gift.)
The event uses the interest to advertise its own products and shop. Of course, it's a good thing, all the power to them, I mean, they did arrange this thing, and should be using it to advertise their own products, BUT... I was expecting something we could make ourselves.
Also, the recipes... blah. I think I would have been more excited with a list like this: "Christmas gift recipes", than some generic cookie recipes. Also, cookie recipes that every family has their own preferred version already.
I have nothing against "farmhouse chic", but I have a lot against "let's bring in all the dirty old crap old people threw away and stain and distress everything because back in the olden days people didn't know how to make things and just nailed two broken boards together and called it a shelf" kind of "chic".
As if Little House on the Prairie from TV got it right! :-D As if! Michael Landon might have thought that some thin, uneven boards nailed on other thin, uneven boards a door makes, but Daddy Ingalls wouldn't have made a door to a dog house like that. Not even when he was 7.
No, gingham doesn't cover sins.
No, you will not bring things in from the barn. Your great-grandparents would have been ashamed!
So, our taste in decor doesn't agree at all. I'm rather disappointed with this. I was expecting something useful.
Also, they keep repeating the ideas and links over and over and over.
On top of that, some of the links are broken, or the image links are broken.
I'm glad I didn't pay anything for this, because it wasn't worth it.
