Homemade Gift Ideas for the Holidays

I went back through my blog recently, and compiled a post today to share many handmade gifts I made over the years.  Hopefully, you will find an idea here, or have one to share.

What I gifted in 2015:  Christmas 2015

Handmade Hand Lotion (they loved this!)  I ended up putting it in 4 oz. canning jars to gift.  I do suggest adding the preservative for gifting too.

Puttin' Up Herbs ~ Handiwork Tidbits

Rosemary and sage filled these two drying racks.

Door Decor ~ Tidbits

The changing of the wreath.

I finally took down my bright, floral door wreath, and put up my fall/winter apple wreath.  I've had this wreath for over 10 years and it still looks nice.  It covers the fall and winter seasons.

A day in photographs. . .a barter

 Well, some of my day anyway.....morning starts with coffee.

Folded Saturday's towels I forgot about.  My "linen" closet is a vintage laundry basket.

Harvesting Black Walnuts

 Yesterday's sunrise.  Just beautiful!

I took some time to pick up two five gallon buckets of our black walnuts.  They have pretty much fallen in the last few days here.  In fact, they were falling on me as I picked them up.  Black walnuts contain more protein than English walnuts and have a stronger flavor.

The hulling and rinsing process is underway, but these will need to dry in the sun.  (click on "read more" to see the remainder of the post).

Sawdust up my nose. . .

The Hubs and I split more wood, and have a pile we still need to stack today.

 

We used a wedge and sledge on about three of these huge pieces, then split them up.  We got our work out for a day.   They look small in the photo, but they are about 3-4 feet wide and larger.   And guess what we found under the  stumps?

Sage Honey ~ Tidbits

I started two jars of sage honey.  This year was a good year for my sage, so I'm drying more for tea and cooking as well.

I filled each jar about half way with snipped, fresh sage.  Then filled the jars with honey.  You can use a spoon to move the sage around to release air bubbles, but I let mine sit a few minutes, and the bubbles released on their own.  The honey level lowered of course, so I then added more honey.