Homemade Christmas thread - arts,crafts,cooking

I thought I'd start a thread about sharing what "homemade" things we'll be making this year
Remember last year when some of us got really excited after watching Kirstie's homemade Xmas shows (& I really wanted to make soap!!) & loads of people have such interesting talents on here I did do Kirstie Xmas stocking to match my living room, but never got round to the soap making
I have 2 ideas so far & the first one is Christmas bunting - easy peezy!! I used to think it was naff, but no!! it's so vogue now & I saw some for sale today for £20 in one of those crafty type shops... and my little head starting buzzing with ideas plus it wouldn't cost me £20 to make my own!!
2nd one is Xmas hanging ornaments
I got this great gold wire tree thing today in a charity shop for £3.50 (another woman had her eye on it but I had it in my hand) so I'm going to make interesting "things" to hang on it.
So come out of the woodwork & show/tell us what you will be making

Hats at moment for me and then dog housecoats and of course doggy Christmas cards !

I'm in the process of building my mum a PC for christmas as I'm fed up of sorting her old thing out!! does that count ??

oooh gorgeus hat I love it, I haven't thought of any gifts to make yet, just the decorations, though I may make cushions for my daughters saying "bitch" & "brat" I was going to put "princess" but they asked for the others & it does suit them

I guess so!! it sure is a talent! I'm rubbish with puters!

My mother just bought a new sewing machine which does embroidery as well so I have requested personalized embroidered gifts for relatives.

I'm going to try patchwork robins, with blanket stitching around the edges for Christmas cards this year.

I feel like I'm running out of time though.

You are!

Get stitching!

rune

Ive been making cards both computer generated and hand crafted which I find relaxing and enjoyable. However unbeknown to me MS Office was only on limited availabilithy on this little netbook and the trial period has ended. Anyone any ideas of free word processors who are as good as MS Word 2007? Ive tried downloading a couple of card making [free] softwear programmes but they are hopeless once you open them up and tryto work with them.I have no cd drive on this netbook to install softwear.

Nice thread.

Last year I had a crowd of friends round for a pre-Xmas meal (all vegetarian or vegan) & I made "goody bags" as pressies for them to take home. I bought some large pretty gift bags & packed them with home made goodies:

• Sloe Gin (in the the 125ml bottles that you get wine in ~ me & OH had to drink lots of wine so I had enough bottles ).
• Piccalili ~ I'd never made it before & don't like it myself but friends that love piccalili though mine was better than the shop-bought ones so I was really chuffed!).
• Beetroot Pickle ~ that turned out really well.
• Spiced pickled shallots ~ I think the chillis I added were too hot so the shallots blew your head off
• Onion marmalade ~ delicious
• Choc truffles ~ naughty but nice
• Scented Candle ~ messy to make

I'm going to do the same again this year & I've already got 2 demijohns of sloe gin on the go.

Wow, where's my invite ;o)