LDS Temple Bracelets How-To

Another gift I made and gave away for Christmas were temple bracelets. I looked around the internet for a step by step picture tutorial to help me, but didn't find one, so I thought I would add one to my blog.

If you want to learn more about the temples of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, go HERE.

Supplies:
-white and clear beads
-alligator clip
-1 mm stretch cord
-jump ring
-clear coat finger nail polish
-jewelry making tools

Steps:
1. Cut stretch cord to desired length. Make sure you add a little more length so you can finish the end of the bracelet.
2. Open the jump ring and insert it through the hole of the alligator clip. Close the jump ring.
3. Thread beads onto the stretch cord.
4. Put one end of the stretch cord through the jump ring hole. Tie the two bracelet ends together. Knot it a few times.

5. Brush some clear coat finger nail polish onto the knot. This will seal the knot. Trim any extra stretch cord.

Different beads, different bracelets!

Since I was giving these as gifts, I found some cute sheer baggies at Hobby Lobby to put each bracelet into.

Family Birthday Board

For this past Christmas, I made our grandparents family birthday boards. Not only is this is a great gift idea for grandparents, but it's a fun creative way to keep track of family birthdays instead of using a boring wall calendar. This is not a full on tutorial, because let's face it, there are many tutorials out there. I just wanted to share my version of the birthday board, a supply list, and where to buy said supplies.

Supplies Needed:
-(1) 8" wide x 6' long pine board (makes 3 boards) Cut to 24"
-walnut stain
-acrylic paint
-vinyl
-eye hooks
-s hooks (buy them here)
-circle/heart wood cutouts w/pre-drilled holes (buy them here)
-little baggies (found at Hobby Lobby in the jewelry isle)
-fine tipped Sharpie

First, I painted the front of each board. Next, I carefully stained the sides and back of the board. Be careful not to get stain on the paint. After all that was dry, I applied the vinyl. Next, I added the eye hooks to the bottom of the board. With that, the board was done.

I decided I didn't want to paint all the wood cutouts, so I limited my painting to the hearts which I decided were for the great-grandchildren (since there are less of them right now). The circles are for the grandparents, children + their spouses, and the grandchildren + their spouses. I got little baggies and put the number of discs/hearts representing each family member in each individual family. For instance, I have my in-laws (2), my husband and I (2), brother/sister in law + son (3), brother in law (1). So in our family baggie we had 7 circles and 1 heart + (8) s hooks. I repeated that for each family unit. I also added a baggie with extra circles for future spouses of grandchildren and also a baggie of hearts for future great-grandchildren. I found a container at a thrift store to put the baggies in. I also added a fine tip Sharpie for writing names and birth dates on the discs.

It was a lot of work, so I'm glad it turned out as awesome as it did!

The Adorable Pallet Snowman

Let me tell you the birth story of this project. My sister's friend bought this snowman in the midwest. Since she knows my sister loves stuff like this, she texted this picture to her. I believe this snowman is made out of a giant spool, unfortunately, that's all I can tell you about it. So, like all our other projects, we dove in and made a plan as we went.

First thing we did was cut 3 (5.5"x 6') cedar fence slats in half (used 5 of the 6 half pieces). We also cut 1 (3.5"x6') cedar fence slat in half. We laid the boards out, found the middle and drew a big circle as shown.

I used my bandsaw to cut each board. I also cut out of the scraps: 2 eyes, 6 circles for the mouth, a nose, star, and a hat. I sanded and painted everything. The face is whitewashed.

Here's a back shot to show how we put this thing together.

This guy turned out so cute! Like with the pallet turkey, I was apprehensive about this project, but with some gentle pushing from my sister, we were able to make a really cute winter craft to display on each of our porches. He is so big that we can see him down the street.

The Adorable Snowman...

My sister came up a few days later and made some snowflakes for her shelf. Each snowflake is different in size and design. We made the winter letters a few years ago.