Ashbee Design

Thursday, November 29, 2012

Hints for Holiday Entertaining • Shared Lists

Lists are an obvious solution for just about everything. I have always been a list maker and it is a critical part of holiday entertaining. In addition to shopping lists, menus, and to-do lists I have a shared list. This list appears 2-3 days ahead of a big event and it is placed right on the end of the the kitchen island for all to see. It is the critical game plan for the last 24 hours before the big event.

Anyone can add to the list although I do most of it. But everyone helps with completing the chores. We have been doing this long enough now that even my sons-in-laws woke up Thanksgiving morning, made their own breakfasts, cleaned up and went straight to the list. They pick the chore they can do, complete it and then cross it off the list. And then they choose the next thing that interests them. One son-in-law vacuumed the entire house, the other cleaned the upstairs bathroom and always chops anything that needs chopping. My daughters have been working off the list since they were little. It makes the holiday more of a family event when all help in the hosting of the party.

The success of the list is that everyone independently chooses what they feel comfortable with. And, it is so very true that many hands make light work. With everyone chipping in, dinner for twenty-one wasn't that big a deal.

We had a great time!

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Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Hints for Holiday Entertaining • Balloons?

My house is holiday central, has been for years. That means lots of entertaining - super sized. Thanksgiving is behind us (twenty-one for dinner and house guests for 7 days) and we are all well into the beginning of the next holiday season be it Christmas or Hanukah or some other celebration. In our home it gets even a little more hectic because my birthday is during the Thanksgiving time frame and my daughter's is the day after Christmas. We celebrate, celebrate, any then celebrate again. I have developed some "routines" that help keep my sanity during these times. I expect others could uses some of these techniques as well. So, today I start a short series on Hints for Holiday Entertaining.

My first hint involves balloons - cut up balloons that is. We had six house guests staying with us during the Thanksgiving holiday, three for seven days and three more for four days. I have learned that with a crew that size, we go through tons of glassware during a day. Often the glasses got scattered around the house but it seems like I was always washing glasses because the cupboard was bare. Several years ago I started the balloon trick.

I had a package of balloons in assorted colors. These were the medium 11" balloons. I cut a band from the center of each ballon. Each family member choose a color and placed the balloon band over their glass.

That glass became their glass for the day. It could be washed with the band on it, even put in the dishwasher. But at anytime each person wanted a drink, they had to locate their glass. Glasses stopped collecting in the upstairs bedrooms or the sunroom. And instead of 6-8 glasses per day per person, we reduced it to 1-2. One chore greatly reduced.

The kids (Kids? Right! The youngest is 30.) automatically go to the balloon drawer upon arrival and choose their color with the first drink they pour. When the grand generation migrates out of bottles and sippy cups I'll buy the pastel package as well as the classic colors to expand the choices.

This is a simple solution that helps with the sanity. Try it!

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Hope to see you there as well!

A Bowl Full of Lemons

Not Just a House Wife

Take It On Tuesday @ Romance On A Dime

Tuesday Treasures @My Uncommon Slice of Suburbia

Simply Sensational Tuesday @ Organizing Homelife

Uncommon Designs

DIY Dreamer

Whatever Goes Wednesday @Someday Crafts

Transformation Thursday @ The Shabby CreekCottage

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House of Hepworths

Between Naps on the Porch

At The Picket Fence

Fridays Unfold @ Stuff and Nonesense

Potpourri Friday @ 2805

Tatertots&Jello

Show and Tell Saturdays

DIY Showoff

Motivate Me Monday @ Keeping It Simple

Get Your Craft On @ Today's Creative Blog

Metamorphosis Monday @ Between Naps on the Porch

Sweet Sharing Monday @ Sweet Anne Designs

Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Silhouette #3 • Lacy Trees

I am starting to get the hang of my new Silhouette cutting tool. I am exploring more of the software tools and learning as I go. My third project is based on a simply beautiful design I found on Pinterest and had saved in my Christmas Ideas folder. I used the shared .pdf template from Ninuska, learned how to import it into the Silhouette software and transfer it to cutting lines to create this lacy Christmas Tree in white card stock.

And then I made two more........

Aren't they stunning?

The design of the lace pattern is not mine but offered for download on the Ninuska blog here. The craft person demonstrating cuts this beautiful design out by hand and if you don't have a cutting machine, you can as well. Gotta say, I am glad I have a cutting machine!

Source: Ninuskan Blog

What I did with the design was to download the pdf at the above site. I then opened it in photoshop and filled the outline with black.

I didn't do that first time round though. There was a learning process of course. I opened the file within the Silhouette software, investigated in the help files how to trace an imported design. I followed them and came up with the following cutting pattern. Notice how each line is outlined on both sides? That translates into every line being cut twice with a slight space between them.

I was fairly sure this wasn't what I wanted. I played with the various trace settings and couldn't get it to read the black lines as a single cut line. I decided to try the cut anyhow and see what happened. Yup, the tree cut but there were all these double cuts leaving a filigree ribbon.

After a little Googling I decided the shape need to be filled with black. After exploring the different tools in Silhouette and being unsuccessful in filling the shape, I opened the pdf in Photoshop and filled it with black. The trace command worked beautifully with the default settings and I cut out two trees using the Silhouette. MUCH faster than with an exacto knife!

My skill at separating the paper from the mat has improved and I didn't experience the tearing problems I had on the first project. I don't pull the paper off. Instead, using the little chisel tool that came with the cutter, I pry it up from the bottom side. I sneak the plastic chisel under and the paper lifts.

The other change is I arrange my paper and the mat so the feeder rolls don't press on the paper but instead track on the edges of the mat.

I cut two identical trees and then, using my sewing machine, I stitched them together right up the center.

I folded them along the stitched seam on both sides to create a standing tree.

Using the re-sizing tools built in to the Silhouette software, I reduced the pattern, cut two trees, reduced it again and cut two more. This created three trees of different sizes.