January 31, 2012

Get your craft on: DIY birdseed ornament tutorial


For Valentine's Day teacher gifts, we're doing heart-shaped birdseed ornaments.  Popular for bird-themed wedding favors, too, this was an easy DIY project that the Gravy Kids enjoyed.

For the heart shapes, I used a donut baking tin I found at Target.  You can use cookie cutters, too, but shelling out the $9.99 was worth it over digging through my basement looking for the box of cookie cutters.  The payment of convenience.


Here's the recipe:
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup water
3 tablespoons corn syrup or honey
1 packet unflavored gelatin
4 cups birdseed
Cooking spray


1. In a large bowl, combine flour, water, corn syrup (or honey), and gelatin.  
2.Add birdseed and mix well.  


 **MODIFIED INSTRUCTIONS BELOW** 
3.  Scoop into greased molds and let dry for several hours before removing from mold.  
4.  Let ornaments dry overnight on wax paper.  


The result should be a distinctly hard ornament the next day.  Any squishiness means that the ornament is not completely dry and may mold if packaged up too soon.


Alternatively, you could use cookie cutters by putting wax paper on top of a cookie sheet and filling the greased cookie cutters with seeds.  Just be sure to insert pieces of straw to leave a hole to tie the string through after the ornament dries.  A mini-bundt pan would probably work well, too.



We wrapped the heart birdseed ornaments into a plastic bag, topped it off with a "love is for the birds" gift tag and voila!  Instant gift.


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January 30, 2012

Free DIY printable: Valentine's Day gift tags


Can you believe it's going to be February this week?  I've already started in on my Valentine's Day teacher gifts which I'll share very shortly.


Until then, enjoy these FREE Good Gravy! printable Valentine's Day gift tags.  Click here to download.


Of course, I couldn't resist throwing in a lovey, but somewhat non-in-your-face Valentine's Day tag with "Your Are My Sunshine."  I love that phrase.


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January 23, 2012

An obvious headline (in this house, at least)

If you're lucky, this news clipping may not apply to you.  However, it greatly applies in the Good Gravy household.  


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January 20, 2012

The naughty list: dog christmas card

My friend Elise's dog, Myko, is quite the character.  So much so that he deserved his own dog Christmas card last month which I designed.  


All items represented in Myko's "file" are hilariously true (okay, well maybe one is a stretch, but we wouldn't put it past him).

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