Archives for December 2011

This is part of the activity advent I’m doing with Little Monkey.  I found this fun little activity at Green Jello with Carrots and, for $2, it wasn’t worth the time it would take me to put it all together.  So, I forked over the cash (actually I ended up spending about $15 and Little Monkey’s Christmas will be full of busy boxes I can use once this baby gets here, but that’s a whole ‘nother post).  All I had to do was print the files off, cut them out and laminate them.  I put magnets on the back and Little Monkey can play with them on the fridge or on the medium-sized baking sheet I had left over from the three pack I bought for my mom’s menu board.  (I actually just bought a smaller pan that Little Monkey can handle better from the Dollar Tree).  It’s been a good activity when we’re out running errands and the little man is getting tired of his car seat.

If you don’t want to cough over the $2, you could spend an hour or two making your own pieces, but I thought it was worth it.  And when my little destructo-saurus ruins the first set (because he will…), I just have to print out a new set.

My uncle got married the weekend after Thanksgiving.  My brother is getting married during Christmas break.  Annnd… I have a niece getting married over New Year’s.  Usually, a wedding gift doesn’t make or break the bank, but three wedding gifts?  And during the cash-strapped holiday season, no less.  I needed something cheap, creative, cute and easy.

The first time I ever did glass etching was at a church activity when I was about 15.  It was too cool.  And super easy.  That was back before crafting with vinyl or Cricut and Silhouette machines.  We cut our templates from index cards with X-acto knifes.  Whoa, right?  Glass etching is a lot easier and yields much more professional looking results than it did when I was 15.

Here’s the How:

Sorry for the lack of in-the-process photos.  It’s kinda a two hand job…

Supplies-
1.  A glass dish or mirror (size is totally up to you)
2.  Glass Etching Cream – I use Armor Etch.  This is a bit pricey, but it will do a ton of projects and last forever.  The only bottle I have ever thrown out before I used it all was my first bottle.  I threw it away when we were packing up to move a couple years ago, I was 22.  It was the bottle I bought for the activity when I was 15.
3.  Vinyl and craft cutting machine.  This is optional.  The old school index card and masking tape method still works.

Directions-
1.  Clean your etching surface.  Wipe dry with a paper towel.
2.  Cut out and apply your vinyl template.  Or your index card, you rebel, you.  Keep in mind that whatever the vinyl covers will still be clear glass (or reflective mirror, if you’re using a mirror).
3.  Apply the etching paste.  What you use to apply the paste isn’t really important.  I’ve used paint brushes, craft sticks, a plastic spoon and, recently, I used half of a clothes pin on my uncle’s dish (go improvisation!).  Cake the goop on thick and make sure it covers your glass well.  Side note: the etching paste stinks.  It just does.  Kind of like rotten eggs or bad flatulence…  A well-ventilated area will help.  Or just hold your breath.
4.  Leave the paste on the glass for 10-15 minutes.  After about 5, I check to make sure it hasn’t settled and left holes.  If there are holes, just goop on some more paste.
5.  When the 10-15 minutes are up, scrape all the paste off the dish and back into your bottle.  The paste will work over and over and it’s FAR TOO EXPENSIVE to just wash it all down the drain.
6.  Wash the remaining paste off the dish and pull your template off.  Rinse the whole dish well.  Dry with a paper towel.  When the etched part of the glass is wet, it’s hard to see the design.  As soon as it’s dry, you’ll be able to see it though.

Here’s a close up of the etch

That’s it.  It’s pretty easy and, because you can reuse the paste, it’s not crazy expensive.  And it’s personalized, which means your crazy Aunt Sue won’t stash it with her other dishes when you accidentally leave it at the family Christmas party.  My kind of gift.  

Wow, 58 parties already?!  Time flies when you’re having fun, huh?  As promised, here are some features from last week’s party, as well as the party two weeks ago.  Some of my faves:

After my husband and I got married, we decided that it was traditions were important to our family.  Not just traditions we each brought from our own childhoods, but establishing traditions for our new and growing family as well.  One of our new traditions is the Christmas Advent Binder.

We have a page protector pocket in our binder for each day in December, up until Christmas Day.  Each page has a short little story and an activity to do as a family.  There is also a CD with 24 Christmas songs (one for each day) but some evenings it gets listened to in it’s entirety. 

We complete one page protector a day, usually in the evenings.  Sometimes on the weekends we’ll do it earlier in the day or in pieces (read the story at breakfast and do the activity a little later in the day when the kiddo is getting restless and bored). 

Not all days are spiritual and religious-based.  Some days are a more relaxed and fun.  The stories have topics from serving others and having gratitude for what we have to helping out at home and, of course, the story of the birth of the Christ-child. 

I got most of the stories from The Friend magazine (published by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints) and the activities were ones I’d gathered from a lot of sources and ideas.  I went through all our Christmas music and chose songs that correlated (as closely as I could find anyway) to the stories.  I tried to do the same with the activities, but some of them are completely random and have nothing to do with the stories.  It’s all good memory building, though.

It’s a fun tradition and a small way to help our family remember that, although the presents and parties are fun, Christmas is about more than what we get under the tree.

Happy Holidays!  And thanks again, Amy!

Krista