DIY Stuffed Hobbes: The Rebirth of A Childhood Friend

How ever were children of the 80's and 90's to learn a good dose of fantasy, sarcasm, and an impressive vocabulary without the stories of Calvin and Hobbes?

Hobbes was a part of so many of our lives growing up, and that homocidal psycho jungle cat is just as cool now as he ever was.

As children, my brother collected all of the books, and together we mourned the tragedy of the comic's discontinuation from the local funny papers.

Now that my brother has little sons of his own, I felt the time had come for them to have their own adventures with dinosaur-flying spaceships and suicidal snowman while accompanied by their new best friend Hobbes.

However Bill Watterson, the creator of Calvin and Hobbes, chose not to license his characters for distribution, so you won't find a Hobbes doll sitting on the shelf at your local toy store. So the best option is to make your own*.

DIY Manly Gift Bucket

 

If you are looking for a gift basket idea for a man in your life, perhaps even for Father's Day, might I suggest the Gift Bucket. 

I admit they can be a little corny and cliché, but sometimes a gift basket is still the best option for a personalized gift for an occasion somewhere between a simple gift card and a new car.

Recently, my big brother turned 30. Gasp! We are, like, almost adults now or something!

My brother already has pretty much anything he could want, right down to the last Tiki mask, and our family doesn't traditionally give gifts on birthdays, so I was a little out of practice finding that one perfect thing.  It was too much pressure putting all of my bets on one gift.

Enter the gift basket. Tons of random things! Some he may enjoy and others he may feed to the cat, but at least I double my chance of an enjoyable gift.

Gift baskets weren't really designed to be "manly" though, so my hubby and I headed off to the hardware store to find a new solution.

DIY Custom Etched Glass Gift: Invite Design to Wedding Gift

Creating Unique & Personalized Wedding Gifts Thru Etched Glass: Part Two

Yesterday, I shared how my friend Suzanne introduced me to DIY etched glass gifts with a unique twist. For a more traditional wedding gift, the bride and groom's name and wedding date are often etched into glass.

To make the gift even more special, why not incorporate elements of design from the wedding invitation? The bride and groom put in a lot of effort picking out the invite or designing it themselves, so it deserves to be commemorated and, luckily, you already know it is an embellishment they'll like!

DIY Custom Etched Glass Gift: The Baron Samedi Rum Bottle

Creating Unique & Personalized Wedding Gifts Thru Etched Glass: Part One

April showers bring May flowers and wedding season! If you're an average twenty-to-thirty-something woman and not a hermit hiding in a mountain cave, then chances are that you know someone getting married this year. The odds are in your favor.

Searching registries for the best gift becomes second nature, but after a while, all the matching towel sets and Pyrex blur together and I become bored with my own gift. Which is a sad predicament, indeed, because I want to give something that screams my enthusiasm for their important day, rather than yawning like a pair of Christmas gift underwear. 

So I'm often torn between my desire to give the bride and groom something practical that they need, but also to give them something memorable, so they can laugh at our inside jokes and know that we cared to add a special touch just for them.

Lately, my solution to this dilemma has been custom etched glass gifts. I was introduced to this craft on Make It & Love It. By adding a creative element to a practical gift, no piece of glass is safe! Any bottle, vase, or Pyrex can become classy or hilarious in less than half an hour.