Religious Archives - Yearning to Create

Missionary Christmas Stocking

The most exciting thing happened!!! My second daughter decided to serve a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

She was called to serve in the Mexico Mexico City Southeast Mission for a year and a half. For the first six weeks of her mission, she was in Provo Utah at the Missionary Training Center (MTC), where she learned how to teach the gospel, and began learning how to speak Spanish. We took her to Utah on December 11, so she was going to be spending her first Christmas away from home in the MTC. It was an awesome experience for her!

Once I realized she’d be gone for Christmas, I started thinking about the first package we’d send her – a Christmas one. I wanted to make her a memorable stocking, yet a humble stocking, and this is what I came up with.

It actually turned out super cute and now I want to make one for everyone in my family, with different quotes/scriptures on them.

First step was to choose what I wanted it to say. For a missionary “Called to Serve” was a pretty good choice! But I was also debating using her favourite scripture “Trust in the Lord” (Proverbs 3:5).

I got my artistic daughter to write out the words and I copied them in pencil on to the drop cloth. Yes, the stocking is made from a drop cloth (what you throw on the ground to protect your floor while painting!). That’s pretty humble fabric!

Then it was simple embroidery in dark brown floss over the letters.

I lined my stocking with the green plaid fabric because I didn’t want the embroidery floss to get snagged when Santa stuffed the stocking.

I lined up my fabrics and sewed them together, overlapping the green over the front of the stocking at the top.

Then with the right sides together, I sewed my stocking together.

I added some gathered eyelet ribbon and a piece of jute string to hang it with.

The final touch was this light brown ribbon/lace trim.

Love how it turned out – and it didn’t cost me a cent. Made it all from stuff I already had.

Santa stuffed it full before shipping it off to her.

Our missionary unpacking her Christmas package – it got to her before Christmas!

Next Christmas her companion is going to have to fill it!

Our missionary’s first Christmas, with a Charlie Brown tree.

Perfect for one who has been Called to Serve the Lord!

Crafts for the Sabbath Day – Primary Birthday Gifts

I look forward to the Sabbath – a day of rest. While attending Church and fulfilling church callings often makes for a busy Sunday, it is certainly different from the regular routine of what I do each day.

I love to make crafts and create things, and have had a craft business in the past and hope to again. So crafting for me is “work” and therefore I don’t do it on Sunday. The Sabbath is a day for me to rest from my labours. So if that crafting bug hits, I’ll only do it if it relates to my church calling.

So last Sunday, we had a craft fest of making Primary birthday gifts.

I became the Primary Secretary in January. These cute little birthday printouts were already planned and I know they came from online somewhere, but I don’t know where so I can’t link it. I didn’t create them, I’m just assembling them!

Lee and I in our living room work station. We were planning to put a “church movie” on from our lovely shelf of appropriate Sunday visual entertainment (there are a ton of great and inexpensive ones from the Distribution Center), but we just chatted instead – always the best thing!

That’s a tub of Ring Pops for the children and a bag of Lindor Chocolates for the teachers.

The scripture marking pencils are from the Distribution Center at $0.25 each.

“I Know the Scriptures are True” is the theme for this year.

Stick the pencil through the tag . . .

(I write the name and date of the birthday person on the back so we know who they belong to. Then they go in a little mailbox that gets opened during birthday time.)

and then . . .

. . . attach the Ring Pop with ribbon and curl the edges – Primary colours of course!

Teacher ones – glad I’m an adult!!! Seriously, do you know how hard it is for me to not eat these Lindors while I make them? I’ve only had one so far and that was because my baby got ahold of one (that was already attached to the card of course!) and started chewing it without removing the wrapper. Well, it was damaged now so I had to sacrifice myself and remove the wrapper and eat the damaged chocolate! The ring pops, however, hold no such temptation!!!

Aren’t they great? I’ve made 74 so far and that takes us to the end of October and then there will be 14 more after that. I made a big batch because we are going to be busy finishing up our house (at least enough finished so we can move in) and moving in the summer. Now they are all being stored in the Primary cupboard and that will be one less thing to think about and move.

So that’s how I craft on Sunday, my day of rest. Or sometimes I work on my Conference Project! I don’t blog on Sunday either, unless it’s my family blog because I consider that Family History and keeping records – it’s my journal writing with lots of pictures thrown in!

We encourage our children not to do school work on Sunday either. They are students, so homework and studying is their “work” and they need to “rest from their labours” as well. I know they have been blessed for their obedience to this commandment, especially during exam time when it is so tempting to study.

No one ever said obedience was easy, but it is always the right thing to do.

Beautifying a Wooden Crate

I found this wooden crate at a thrift store quite a few months ago, and it’s been sitting in my bathtub waiting for me to do something with it. (Yes, the bathtub! You know, the jetted tub that you want to use but don’t have time for. And since I don’t have any closets or shelves anywhere yet, the bathtub seems like a pretty good storage spot!)

First step was painting it inside and out. I was lucky enough to have leftover paint from my laundry room (Grey Evening by Behr).

Now my plan for this crate was to sit in the living room and look pretty, while serving the very important duty of holding our scriptures. So when we all gather in the morning for family scripture study, our books are right there! Brilliant!!!

Since it was going to always be in plain sight, I wanted to put a special message on the side of the crate. I chose our family motto which comes from Mosiah 4:15 “Love one another and serve one another.”

I used the carbon paper method to get the letters on the crate. Print the words you want, put a piece of carbon paper between the crate and your paper and then trace the letters. Then comes the fun part of hand painting the letters. Use a fine tip brush and have a steady hand! Oh, and I lightly sanded first before tracing the letters.

I wanted my message to be visible, but not overpowering, which is why I used a light paint colour. Using a sanding sponge I sanded the rest of the crate, being sure to let wood show through on the edges. Then I went and hid out in the mechanical room and stained the whole thing (garage was too cold and I didn’t want to stink up the house with the delightful smell of stain). I used Minwax Dark Walnut because that’s what I had on hand. I would stain one side and then rub it off – didn’t want it getting too dark.

Recently I did something I’d never done before . . . bought coffee filters! Apparently they’re a pretty handy crafting material. My seven year old thought they were large muffin wrappers! So I played around making flowers today in home school while doing math with her.

And this is what I ended up with . . .

Close up of burlap bow, coffee filter flowers and babies breath.

I glued a strip of burlap all around the crate. I used a glue gun to quickly hold the burlap in place and then craft glue to secure it all over. This burlap has a wide weave so it frays easily and it has too many holes to deal with hot wax! (I know what you’re wondering, and yes, I burned my fingers!)

I made the dark shadows (or antiquing) by rubbing Burnt Umber oil paint in strategic places. It’s one of my favourite ways to distress things.

Lacie’s pretty impressed! (the dog)

This is the backside – with just a cute little strip of burlap all the way around.

This is where it goes, and there’s four of my girls in the background playing “Sorry” (no my two-year can’t actually play “Sorry”, which makes me wonder how she managed to win!).

Just think what the world would be like it everyone lived by this creed. I can’t teach the world, but I can teach my family!

There it sits, doing its job holding our scriptures and quietly sending out a marvellous message. Sure loving my crate!

How to Decorate with Food Storage

A few weeks ago I had to give a little talk about Family Home Storage (because I’m such an expert!). My information mostly came from the March 2009 Ensign – you can read that by clicking here.

In a nutshell, we are counselled to:

1) Have a three month food supply (and that would include all consumables like toilet paper, shampoo and deodorant – anything you wouldn’t want to be without!).
2) Store drinking water.
3) Establish a financial reserve.
When the first three objectives have been met, then we are counselled to:
4) Gather a supply of long term basic food items that would sustain life (grains, legumes, milk, honey, salt, etc.)

Anyway . . . here are some other uses I’ve found for long term food storage items!

A large vase looks lovely filled with split green peas – nice and springy!

A mason jar looks lovely filled with beans!

Pinto beans to be exact!

Wheat and rice work great for decorating too. I’ve often had fancy jars filled with wheat sitting on a shelf. Have you ever just chewed on grains of wheat? It’s what the pioneers used as gum! And I must say that freshly sprouted wheat is simply delicious and so full of vitamins.

So rather than simply storing your stuff away in a cold dark spot, try decorating with it!

Conference Project Update

Ahhh, there were lots of inspiring talks at Conference!!! Can’t wait to attack my copy of the Ensign with a highlighter, looking for special quotes that touch my heart that I can turn into a craft!!!

And yes, I got lots of cross-stitching time in! Took breaks only to stand up and sing the rest hymn and to nurse my baby. Here’s how it looked at the end of conference . . .

Getting lots of background done – it goes so much faster as lots of it is only a half-stitch.

Can you remember how much was done before the weekend? I can’t!!!

Oh wow – I got lots done!!! Good for me!

Look at all those stitches!!! It’ll be even more clear when I outline it someday with a dark backstitch.

And now I might dig it out and stitch a little for a day or two, but mostly it will sit until the next conference in six months. And just think – then I’ll be doing it in my new house!!!