So my relatives this year decided to revive our old “Sipka Family Craft Exchange.”
It’s something we used to do when I was back in junior high, and my mom and all her sisters (who were, like, my age now I guess!) would do their Christmas crafts every year.
They began the “Sipka Family Craft Exchange” where each crafter would send a number of crafts to all participants in the mail, and we’d end up recieving a great big box from Ohio with fun hand-made gifts each year. Most of my aunts made Christmas-themed crafts, like ornaments (or, of course, my mom’s 1970s macrame and rug-loom items).
When I got to be in high school, and had about 7 cousins all in high school too, we jumped into the fray some years. I was quite a crafter back then, so I’d always try to keep up with my mom and aunts (I made lots of wreaths, ornaments, and bells with too many ribbon roses …).
But my greatest memory of the Sipka Family Craft Exchange was when my two teenage boy cousins, Donny and Mike, sent their own package in the mail. Continue reading