May you have a wonderful *fill in celebrated holiday name*

“ It’s not always the gifts that are wrapped
which are the best,
but simply those that are shared.
Gifts of time, love, and laughter…
Happy memories that warm the heart
at Christmas time and always.”

I hope every one of you who celebrates it has a wonderful, love, light and laughter filled
Christmas/Yule/Hanukkah/Hogswatch/Kwanzaa/Samhain/Festivus/etc.
May you have a lovely and especially relaxing time and find your desired amount of books/bookish/writerly/foodie/crafty goodies under your tree.

Homemade Gifts {in a Jar} part 2

Last week, I told you all about my gift in a jar Chocolate Chip Cookies for the Chef.

Now, for the seamstress in my life, I decided to make a sewing-kit jar. Here’s how I did it.

Sewing-kit jar

Fill the jar of your choice, with different things a seamstress would appreciate (I chose beads, embroidery thread, yarn, buttons, chalk, pins and needles, etc.)

I really liked the idea of the pincushion lid, but knew my grandmother wouldn’t really want to keep the jar, so I decided to make one of these really cute Tuna Can Pincushions I’ve had my mind on ever since my friend Patsey posted her tutorial.

After I finished both the jar and pincushion, I stuck the tuna can pincushion onto the lid with a simple double adhesive tape so it would stay on there until/during Christmas gift giving and then come off easily.

Happy crafting everyone

Homemade Gifts {in a Jar} part 1

Sometime last week, I stumbled upon Myra’s blog post, 12 Homemade Gifts In A Jar and I was floored. I instantly fell in love with all of these ideas, and since I’d personally love to receive something like this, I decided to make some gifts in jars myself.

The first one I made is a gift to the Chef in my life who doesn’t really like the precision of measuring ingredients for baking. I figured this would be the perfect St.Nick’s Day gift – and I was right, he loved it

Chocolate Chip Cookies – Homemade gift in a jar

(I used my own adapted version of this Chocolate Chip Cookies recipe.)

Layer the ingredients in a large enough mason jar, starting with the necessary dry ingredients like sugar, flour (+ baking soda and salt mixed into it), cocoa and only then add your additional dry ingredients like chocolate chips, hazelnuts, Rahat Locoum (Turkish Delight), granola, cereals, raisins, etc.

Screw the lid on the jar, and cover with a circle of fabric or a paper doily, held down with a rubber band. Cover the rubber band with yarn or ribbon and tie a bow. For additional beauty, tie a cinnamon or vanilla bar into the bow. (I did that just before gifting the jar.)

Print out a gift tag-type paper with the recipe, or simply glue further directions onto the jar like I did, mentioning what else needs to be added, at what temperature the cookies need baking and for how long.

* I personally added a bunch of extra ingredients the original recipe didn’t include, so I upped the quantity of eggs and butter needed. Make sure you do the same if you need to.

Come to think about it, I’ve actually given gifts in a jar before, in the form of homemade beauty products. I think my Beauty the natural way recipes (Face Mask, Bath Salts, Exfoliating Body Scrub, Body Balm, Facial Scrub, etc.) are perfect for the ladies in your family so flip through the pages and feel free to prepare any of those. I’m sure they will be greatly appreciated.

Hope you all like these ideas, and check back next Wednesday for part 2

 

PS: there are a ton of gifts in a jar ideas out there on the web, you’re bound to come across the perfect one for your loved ones.

Happy Bunny Day!

Wishing everyone a wonderful, sunny day filled with joy and lots of happy moments!

Happy Easter!

Love is…

“Love is over-thinking for the millionth time what you want to say,
rephrasing, cutting and pasting, editing until you’re out of rational thoughts – then not having to say any of it aloud
because he/she can feel every single one of your unspoken words.”
~ Estrella Azul

 

Tomorrow is a new day

Have you guys made any New Year’s resolutions? Will you work hard on keeping them or will they be forgotten in the following few days when the hectic-ness of everyday life takes over again?
Do they matter?

I’ll make and reaffirm my life choices whenever needed; when I walk on a different path or make my own path, when I feel lost or confused, when I’m in need of a change, when I want to experiment and when I make mistakes…
Some of these happen often enough that I have a New Year almost monthly

I like the prospect of tomorrow being a new day.
Tomorrow is always a new day with no mistakes in it yet.
It always offers a chance to turn the page on yesterday,
even on last year, and its old ways.

2010 has been a year of angst, of possibilities, of mistakes, of dreams come true, of striving for the best I can achieve and be, of hope, of helplessness, opportunities, of Life… It has been one of the messiest, scariest, toughest, challenging, yet also one of the best years so far.

So, I’ve decided to re-work a bit, add a few things to my personal commandments list and publish that as opposed to a resolutions list, precisely because I think personal commandments are the core behind everything else we may want to achieve, the principles that guide our lives.

 

Estrella Azul’s Personal Commandments

• Be Estrella
• Dare to dream and dare to live
• Be flexible, be willing to compromise and make course corrections
• Be determined and diligent -> stay positive and maintain optimism as much as I can
• Listen carefully so I can learn something new as often as I have the chance to
• Know my weaknesses -> embrace them, and learn how to overcome them
• Enjoy Life more -> decide to ‘Go For It’ when I have a good opportunity, and remember to have fun and enjoy the journey
• Be grateful for all I have and all I am -> ‘give back’ with kindness and charity, help others
• Accept that Life is messy -> that I need to make messes in order to find out who I am and why I’m here
• Notice the little things
• Be creative, improvise, work with what I have and sometimes, if I’m really lucky, what I’ll have will turn out to be exactly what I need
• Know that it’s okay to follow someone else’s lead from time to time
• Leap (and the net will appear!)

 

Now it’s your turn, tell me, what are your personal commandments, resolutions and or expectations from yourself for 2011?

It’s not always…

Last year I received a greeting card
from a very dear friend of mine which read:

 

“ It’s not always the gifts that are wrapped
which are the best,
but simply those that are shared.
Gifts of time, love, and laughter…
Happy memories that warm the heart
at Christmas time and always.”

 

So I’m using this as my Christmas greeting to all of you, as these few lines express everything I believe in!

 

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

 

PS: Loving right now –> this book Christmas tree made by the folks at Gleeson library in San Francisco last year. [via Recyclart]