Yes, I realize that my wedding is a year away, but when it’s cold out, it’s fun to stay inside and do some wedding-related crafts (and cook some wintery meals). All of the crafts and most of the foodstuff I’m detailing here is my first ever attempt at making them…You get a lot of take-out when both people are working. Here’s the first wedding project I started (note “started” not yet finished):
Basically I’m using watercolors to paint these gift tags in ombre blue and then I’m going to write guests’ names on them, stamp them with table numbers and use them as escort cards. Originally I tried to dip them into water mixed with paint, but that just made them soggy and didn’t impart enough color (I probably should have used ink instead of watercolor paint but it was too late, that’s what I had bought). I moved on to using brushes to paint them, and I like how each is slightly different and looks handmade.
I saw these tissue paper tassel garlands on Instagram and decided that I could make them myself, so I purchased (and scrounged in my gift wrapping box) some tissue paper and Googled how to start.
(Picture from bridalmusings.com and garland made by Confetti System.)
They take a little while and some concentration, but now that I know I can do it, I’m going to buy some more tissue colors to make all sorts of combos. One trick is to iron the sheets of tissue paper on low heat first so that the tassels don’t have crinkles in them.
Fold the tissue paper in half twice and cut strips leaving about an inch at the top. Unfold once, cut the paper in half to create two tassels. Unfold again so that you get this tentacle-looking piece, then start rolling tightly from one end in the middle all the way down the crease. Once you get it rolled, you’ll have a tightly wound middle part with sprays of paper fanning out on either side. Pinch the rolled middle part in half and start twisting like a twist tie so the tassel parts come together and you create the top part through which you can thread a string or ribbon. Gently comb the strips with your fingers so that they fall nicely into tassels.
Then you can thread some sort of wire/thread/string/ribbon through the twisted top. I tied a loose knot after passing through each loop to keep them spaced equally. Hang on a window like this, on the mantle, or wherever else might be festive!
Here is another Thanksgiving-themed garland I put together. Full disclosure: this was a cute little crafting kit that my aunt gave me for Hanukkah. It did take some work in terms of cutting, pasting, creating paper leaves and tying the burlap ribbons into perfect bows.It was super fun.
Making this necklace might not seem totally like a craft, but let me assure you that it took me at least three trips to Michael’s to purchase the correct clasp and clear plastic filament, so I think the effort exuded qualifies this as a legit project. This peachy faux-pearl necklace was originally on cotton string and belonged to my grandmother Honey. I was wearing it wrapped a few times around my wrist as a bracelet, when all of a sudden, the string broke and the beads rolled everywhere. I swear, I didn’t even make any sudden movements – the string just disintegrated. Coincidentally, this was during Friday night temple services that I was attending for Honey’s yahrzeit (remembrance of the anniversary of her death), and I was wearing it in her honor. Embarrassingly crawling on my hands and knees to retrieve the errant beads around the pews and people’s legs, I stuffed them in my purse and vowed to restring them to make something wearable once again. Although I don’t think I got quite all the pearls, it was fun parsing and arranging the ones I had collected in the correct order to remake the choker.
The necklace project got me excited to do more jewelry projects, and over Thanksgiving, I received some costume jewelry that belonged to Honey’s cousin, Janet, including many delicate metal and enamel flower brooches that I’m thinking of making into some sort of shadow box wall art.
In terms of cooking, I’ve been whipping up a storm of cookies and other cold weather treats. A photo gallery of some of my faves so far:
Make your own pizza creations!
Pumpkin everything:
Pumpkin bread with pumpkin pulp that I roasted, scooped and pureed myself! Look ma, no cans (of pumpkin puree)!
Roasted pumpkin seeds with butter and a lot of salt 🙂
Pumpkin chocolate chip cookies. Okay, this time I had run out of hand-scooped pumpkin and did use the canned stuff.






