Just to give you an idea of the many different gift boxes I can make
for you, I have taken a picture of a few of these boxes together. The
theme of these boxes is rather "girlish", but I can make it anything you
wish. Some boxes can be made in different sizes, too! Let me know what you are looking for and I will create just the right gift box for you!
From
left to right in the back you see a tall pinch box, a cake slice box
with a purse box on the of it, a heart topped box on top of a cube and a
chair shaped box. In the front you see a box that resembles a Christmas
cracker. All of these can be filled with anything you like: candy, mini
chocolates, chocolate almonds for wedding of baptism, You Name It!
This is such a cute alternative to the diaper cake! The tricycle is made of 30 diapers and has 2 bibs, 2 baby bodysuits and a plush animal for the baby to play with. Who doesn't want to impress the new parents with a great looking and useful gift? This tricycle makes a great gift to welcome the new baby, for the first birthday or even for a baptism. As an alternative, we can also make a motorbike (with just 2 wheels) and include more baby items. You Name It, we will make it!
One more item that I really enjoy making is (birthday) invitations. Back to where it all started (see first post)! The number of lay outs and designs is enormous, and can be adjusted to the occasion, theme and age. Even pictures can be included in your design! Below you see a recent birthday invitation as an example of what I can make for you. I have made these with a fold-over flap in a color that matches the design of the card. Of course, you can also have the invitation with a plain envelope.
Let me know what the occasion and the age of the recipients is, and I am sure I can make a great personalized invitation for you. You will definitely make a bigger impression with your own design than you would when using the pre-printed cards that are available in the store!
Inspired by the invitation we received for the baptism of a little girl, I made a present in the same style. I designed a custom wrapper for a gift can (that I filled with coins) and made it into the princess castle that was on the invitation. On the back of the gift can is a little poem about saving a coin each day in order to be able to buy her very own castle one day.
Had I told you before that the possibilities of the gift can are endless?? Whatever the occasion you need a present for: I am sure I can make a special personalized gift for you! Which is exactly why I called my little gift-wrap business: You Name It (we have it!). More to come tomorrow!
Unfortunately, life is not only about parties and celebrations... When we heard a friend of ours from Holland had passed away, I felt like there was something I had to do in her memory. This lady has been coming to Samos for so many years and is loved by so many people in our village, that I thought of creating a memory book to send to her husband.
I gave out specially made cards to the people that have known her, so that everybody could write a personal message to her husband. I then collected and laminated all these cards, and made them into a small "memory book". I will only put up a picture of the front of the memory book here, but I can tell you that her husbands reaction was heart warming. He was so glad with this little keepsake that made for him!
This is an idea that you can easily put together yourself, but I will me more than happy to assist if you would like to have some help in creating a wonderful memory book for a loved one.
For the birthday of one of our best friends' daughter, I decided I would try something new. Instead of just making a set of personalized candy boxes and wrapped chocolates, I thought of putting all these on a diaper cake. This 3-tier birthday cake consists of: 30 diapers, 2 gable boxes filled with candy, 2 personalized chocolate bars, 12 wrapped mini chocolates, a wrapped can of powder milk and 2 toys.
In times of crisis, what more can you ask for than a present full of daily necessities for a little baby girl? Our friends certainly enjoyed it. If you like to impress somebody with a great looking and useful gift, you know where to find us!
Easter is an important holiday in Greece and its celebration holds many rites and rituals. If I do find the time to write a blog about living in Greece, I will gladly tell you all about it!
This year, we were invited to celebrate and have dinner at a friend's place. Except for the salads that I prepared for the occasion I also made a cute little Easter present for our hosts. The gable boxes are filled with personalized chocolate bars, mini chocolates and Easter eggs.
This tealight cover that I also put inside the gift box says: "may the Holy Light enlighten your lives and your souls!" I think they are so cute! Over here in Greece where we have black outs so often, one can never have enough candles! The message and the design on the tealight cover is all up to you.
My oldest son is already so used to the fact that mommy makes gifts, that he is not afraid to ask for a last minute favor.
One evening before he goes to bed he tells me that the next day he has a birthday party at school, and that he is supposed to bring a gift. "You will make something, right?" Well, here is the result of a last minute gift can, that has 2 personalized chocolate bars inside for his teacher's son who turned 1 year old.
The next gift can is for the birthday of a friend who is quite a handy man and whose favorite expression is "no stress".
I made him a "nuts" can, filled with roasted almonds. The possibilities for these cans are endless!
Do you know somebody that could use a little cheering up? A "get well" gift can makes a cute present for somebody who is not feeling well. These gift cans can be filled with candy, mini chocolates or small gifts. You can either get an empty personalized can and fill it up yourself, or ask us to make it a complete wrapped up gift.
I have are so unbelievably many Christmas designs at You Name It that it was difficult for me to pick just one to start with. These snowmen were the lucky ones to be used in my first Christmas chocolate wrapper. The red foil pouch contains a chocolate bar in this case, which I then wrapped with the personalized wrapper. Other things that would fit in the foil pouch (I have 8 different colors of those!) are cereal bars, candy bars or even little crayons.
The mini wrappers in the same design are used for the small (Lacta) chocolates.
The first person to receive a personalized gift was my father-in-law. I made him a cute little take-away box which held some personalized chocolates.
He was so enthousiastic about this personalized gift box that he immediately suggested "doing something with this". Little did he know that I had already asked a dear friend of mine to help me out with a logo! Can't try to open a business without a logo, right? Here's what we came up with:
Now that the family is positive about my new venture and that I have a logo, it's time to get started! In the following posts, I will show you other projects and products I have been working on. Please let me know if you have any ideas or suggestions!
Here it is: the first post of what I hope will be a great experience and a successful home-based business! Let me tell you how I got here and what I plan on doing on my little spot on the web.
I live on Samos Island in Greece with my husband and our 2 boys. My husband and I run a water sports center from May until October, and spend our time in the winter collecting our olives and making our own olive oil. If I find the time for it, I might even start another blog about our beautiful island, showing everybody what a great place it is to visit for holidays! For now though, this blog is about my trying to find something to do besides our summer job: something I could do to escape from the daily household chores and that I would enjoy doing.
After our first son was born, I decided to make our own birth announcements. Come to think of it, that is probably when my little creativity seed was planted!
Where I used a template from a card-making website for this birth announcement, I soon moved on to making the baptism invitations from scratch. The response from family and friends was wonderful! I guess this is where I subconsciously started my personalized cards business.
Needless to say that I made both birth announcement and baptism invitations for our second son as well. In the winter after our youngest son turned 1, I started looking into expanding my hobby. I created Christmas & Easter cards and personalized wrappers for chocolate and candy bars. During the summer while I was working at our water sports business, there is hardly any time for non-beach related activities, but in the winter I continued to expand my graphics library.
Now that another summer season has come to an end, I feel I am ready to try and make my hobby into a small home based business. I hope you enjoy reading about and looking at my newest creations, as I will post them on this blog. Your comments and suggestions are welcome! Thank you for joining me on this new adventure!
