I remember when I was a kid that I had an awesome felt Advent Calendar to use every year during the month of December. My grandma made it for her kids when they were young and it was passed down to me. Sadly, I have no idea where the calendar ended up (I sure wish I knew). I was thinking to myself that it would be fun to have one for my kids to use every year....and maybe pass it down to their kids. So I got to work!I Google-searched 24 images of items I wanted for the calendar and printed them out on paper, then cut them out and used them as templates for the ornaments.I made 2-3 ornaments each week during the summer and really tried to add as much detail as possible to the ornaments to make them extra special. I'm pretty pleased with how they turned out. What do you think???I made a stocking for each one of the kidsSanta, Christmas bag, Cardinal (for my grandma), Candy CaneChristmas Tree, Hot Cocoa, Gift, BellGingerbread Man, Ice Skate, Baby Jesus, HollyPoinsettia, Snowflake, Light, … [Read more...]
Christmas in July- Make your own Snow
Do you ever want to play with snow inside and not have it melt all over the place? Make your own fake snow! Perfect for these HOT July days! It's great for decorating , letting your kids drive their toy cars through or just plain playing in! All you will need is: A few unused disposable diapers (It would be super gross to use dirty diapers.) Water A container to mix in silver glitter (optional) Ok, now this is so easy you are going to think you missed something! 1) Cut open the diaper and pull out the inside absorbent layer. 2) Put it in the container and slowly add water 3) Mix until it becomes snow consistency! For powdery snow use less water, for slushy snow use more water. 4) Add a bit of glitter for some sparkle. (optional) My girls had a TON of fun playing with the snow! We attempted to add more water and make a snowman but it wasn't really successful. My girls did however, enjoy adding more and more water to see how slushy they … [Read more...]
Make your own ornaments
Something my mom and I used to do a lot when I was younger (and pre-kids) was paint Christmas ornaments. It's really simple to do and MUCH cheaper than some of those fancy shmancy ones you can purchase. Here is what you need: GLASS ornaments (trust me the plastic ones don't work) Acrylic paint Add a few drops of paint to the inside of each ornament Roll the ornaments carefully around to get the paint to cover the entire inside Allow each ornament to dry upside down and the excess paint to drip out You can stop there and hang them or you can glue pretty ribbon to the tops of the ornaments...it's really up to you! … [Read more...]
Origami Wreath
I was blog hopping the other day (yup, I'm a rabbit) and saw some really neat tutorials for Origami projects. One that really struck me was a tutorial for an Origami Wreath. I just happened to have a bunch of Christmas themed 12" x 12" paper laying around and I thought I would try to make a wreath with my oldest boy. I had to play around quite a bit because the tutorial was in Japanese (I think) and the measurements were in metric, but I think you could say our wreath was a success! (He...OK, I, didn't want to stop making them!) Here is what you will need to make an Origami Wreath of your own: 12 sheets of colorful paper (pattern and print of your choice) a ruler 1. Carefully mark each sheet of paper on the back side. One line should run horizontal 5 inches from the bottom of the paper, 2 other lines should run vertical about 5.4 inches from each side. Like so... 2. Fold two of the corners down to the lines as demonstrated in the photo. 3. Fold the … [Read more...]
Santa Trail Mix
Pintrest- you've probably hear of it, and if not you probably live here... it's a rock...in case you can't tell If you're not on Pintrest and would like to be then shoot me an email and I will be happy to send you an invite (it's exclusive like that). I saw a great idea for a Christmas trail mix on that site and I though to myself "self, that is some tasty looking mix! You should make some and add your own jazz and spice to it." My kids were happy that I had that conversation with myself because it sure is yummy! Here's what you will need: 2 cups of red and green M&Ms 1 cup of dry roasted peanuts 1/2 cup of Craisins or other dried fruit 2 cups of Chex cereal (I used the rice version) Pretzels (holiday shaped ones are best) Bugles mini marshmallows coarse sugar 1 package of red melting discs (candy aisle) 1 package of green melting discs (same aisle) 1 package of white chocolate chips (or almond bark) Shortening Assembling the Santa … [Read more...]
Candy Cane Vase
My oldest (5yrs) and I really love candy canes. If I am being 100% honest with you (and I always am) I purchase boxes and boxes and boxes of candy canes every time this time of year comes around. I love to eat them and decorate with them (and he does too!) This year we made a fun and really easy festive vase for our table out of candy canes. Here is what you will need: a glass vase (either square, rectangle or circle- a vase with a neck doesn't really work for this) some holiday ribbon candy canes low-temp glue gun Gage how much space the candy canes will take up and use the remaining amount to fill in with ribbon. I used ribbon around the base of the vase. We kept our candy canes wrapped to avoid sticky fingers (and sneaky licks). Using a low temp glue gun apply a ribbon of glue to the candy cane (not the vase- it will harden before you have a chance to apply the candy cane). Once you have covered the vase with the desired candy canes attach a bow around … [Read more...]
