Handmade Christmas: The Rest

Now that you've seen the two big projects we worked on - the handprint calendars and the felt animal book - here's everything else!

One of my cousins and his family lost their Christmas tree and all of their ornaments because their basement flooded last year.  So another cousin sent out a request to send them ornaments, which I was glad to do!  I made some fake wedding invitation ornaments like I usually do for wedding gifts, using their names and anniversary info.

I also "minion-ized" their family, and I think that turned out pretty well for freehand drawing.

For several relatives we made these colorful bauble ornaments, using pipe cleaners, ribbons, and sequin mix.

There were a couple Packer ones, a Mickey Mouse one, and one that was simply purple-themed.

I also made coordinating dish cloths to go with most of those.

We made treat plates for the neighbors, and the kids had fun helping deliver those.  (We may have used some of our leftover treats from church, along with our homemade goodies, because we got so many treats!)

And everybody always loves the Ritz sandwiches, so I made two batches of those to include with gifts as well.

And then I got to wrap everything up and mail it away.  

Helpful Links:

• Wedding Invitation Ornaments
• Knitted Dishcloths
• Ritz Cookies

Whew!  That was all a lot of work!  This year I'm hoping to start working on projects sooner.  Then again, I always say that...

Handmade Christmas Gifts: Felt Animal Book

Today's project is the one that took the longest, and that I almost gave up on.  I saw this little felt book idea in a link-up, and I thought, "Oh that's cute.  I could do that for my niece!"  And then I started.

The fabric I picked for the cover from my random bin of fabrics was a silky one.  Very pretty.  Very unforgiving. I had to redo the cover, because the first time it pulled wonky and didn't lay flat.

I don't sew very well.  I mostly taught myself.  So there are plenty of imperfections in this book.

But it's still really cute!  

The little pouch at the back holds all the clothes for the three animals to dress up in.

Some are casual.  

Some are seasonal.

My favorite is the little tuxedo and the kitchen apron.  I really had a lot of fun coming up with some different outfits!

So the back pouch is kind of full.  I opted for snaps to hold the whole thing shut, because that's easier for a kid than tying a ribbon.  I think.  I hope.

Helpful Links:

• My Little Dress Up Book Template and Directions, which is currently not pulling up the correct thing.  Hopefully they get that fixed soon!

Handmade Christmas: Handprint Calendars

If you haven't guessed by now, I like to make some of the presents that we give out for Christmas.  I truly enjoy making things for others, and it usually saves us some money as well.  Plus, I like to think that the recipients enjoy these gifts as well!  

I saw the idea for a handprint/footprint calendar awhile ago, and we ended up making two of them this year, for Jesse's mom and for my parents.

I involved all of the kids, and we set to painting.  The first time around we did the painting over three days, and the second time we just powered through and did the whole thing all at once.  I don't know if either method is better, but I know from a painting-is-chaos-at-my-house perspective, it was easier for me to have one crazy time and then be done as opposed to getting the mess out a few days in a row.

I went with mostly seasonally appropriate items, although we did a bunny for Easter because I couldn't come up with a Jesus-y one that wasn't weird.

My favorite is probably these footprint tulips, if only because it has all four kids' feet on it.

Helpful Links:

• 2016 Calendar Template
• Various Handprint/Footprint Ideas with pictures

I made sure to label what each picture is, and whose hand or foot made it.  This was a really fun project, and the kids liked it too!

Our Four-Gift Christmas

There are a few cool ideas out there for how to give gifts to your children for Christmas.  And by that, I mean if you want to have a certain number, or a meaning behind the gifts.  Not how to wrap them up and hand them over.  Hopefully, you can figure that part out on your own.

In the past years, we've just kind of gone shopping and found things we liked, making sure to get an equal number for the kids that are paying attention to that sort of thing.  This year I mentioned the "something they want, something they need, something to wear, something to read" idea, and Jesse liked it, so we (mostly) went with that.

Jonah:

• Want: This Lego pack.  He has spoken of nothing but this Lego pack with his favorite character Skylor in it for the past three months or so.
• Need: Kids need Jesus.  We got him a Bible stories dvd.
• Wear: Captain America shirt.  We like our superheroes, and these shirts were on Target clearance for like $2.
• Read: Wild Kratts Sea Creatures . The boys like the show, and sharks are his favorite animal.

 Matthew:

• Want: We scored the very cool Lego Samurai pack on Ebay for $14.  It's retired, and it was originally about a $50 set, I think.  The Samurai is Matthew's favorite Ninjago character.
• Need: Jesus again.  We got him a Bible Stories dvd also, completing our set (we had 2 of the 4 already).
• Wear: Lego guy shirt, also Target clearance.
• Read: Wild Kratts Snakes and Reptiles .  They didn't have one about kangaroos, which are his favorite.

Hannah:

• Want: Daniel Tiger Trolley .  "Dan Dan" is her favorite favorite.
• Need: Here's where we deviated, because she didn't really need anything, so we went with the Daniel Tiger character 5-pack to go with the trolley.
• Wear: Minnie Mouse socks using a $5 Famous Footwear coupon from my email.
• Read: Dan Dan, of course.  Daniel Tries a New Food , because she's being extra picky about food lately.

Elizabeth got a box of Kleenex.  Really.  She is always pulling out Kleenex or baby wipes, so we gave her a box of her own to do what she wished.  She enjoyed it quite a bit!  One year olds don't need a lot of presents anyways, at least not in my opinion, and the kids all get gifts from relatives and church members as well.

So that's what we got for Christmas.  I really liked having the four things to keep us in check from spending overload, and I enjoyed putting a spin on each category depending on what the kids like.  We ended up opening presents this morning because we'll be at church tonight and all morning tomorrow.  And honestly?  We were excited too.

Check back next week to see all the projects I made to hand out for gifts this year!

Disclosure: Some of the links in this post are affiliate links.  Buying through these links doesn't cost you anything, but it adds a little bit to our budget for things like Christmas presents for the kids.  And toilet paper.  

What We Do To Celebrate Advent and Christmas

I've seen several other bloggers posting their Advent traditions, and I thought I'd share mine as well.  Kind of.  We don't have a ton of traditions for Advent and Christmas yet.  We're still figuring out what we like and don't like, and what works for our family.

For Advent itself, we do a couple things.  We have an Advent wreath on our dining room table, which we light at dinner time.

And we also have this 12 day Advent calendar, which we use as our nightly devotions leading up to Christmas Day.  Each box has a little cutout inside with the person or thing of the day, and the devotions focus on that.  The boxes turn around to make a nativity scene.

The kids like to take turns with that.  Sometimes we have the chocolate calendars, and the past two years we had the Lego Advent calendars, but this year we didn't end up getting anything extra. We have an ornament that plays either a hymn or a part of the Christmas story for 25 days, but we didn't end up getting that out this year.  Once the kids put their ornaments on the tree, I thought it looked nice, so I didn't bother getting out the rest of the ornaments.

We also have church each Wednesday night, which is still difficult for Elizabeth, because she wants to either crawl around or go to bed, neither of which is an option.  Next year will be a different world, I can already tell.

I've been trying to limit the extra activities, because we end up being really busy in December anyways, but there are a few things we are going to try to make time for.

• Making paper chains to countdown to Christmas.
• Decorating the Christmas tree.
• Decorating flat gingerbread houses.
• Driving around to see the Christmas lights.
• Sending out Christmas cards. 
• Making a fun garland to hang over our school room doorway.
• Make a Lego nativity.
• Adding some fun Christmas worksheets and activities to our school day.  I've been saving things like nativity puppets and word searches and color by numbers for days when we want to still do something, but not necessarily anything too hard.

Will we get to all of these? Maybe.  Maybe not.  If not, there's always next year.  What do you do during the Advent and Christmas season?

White Chocolate Treat Mix

When we visited my parents over Thanksgiving, my mom gave me some extra almond bark that she wasn't going to use.  I knew I wanted to make some sort of treat, and one that the girls could actually eat (although we'll probably still make some more of these!).

So we came up with a popcorn Chex mix that is easy to make and really tasty.

Ingredients:

• about 10 cups popped popcorn
• about 3 cups Chex cereal
• about 1/2 cup M&Ms or candy of your choice
• about 1/2 package almond bark, melted

Directions:

Mix the first three ingredients in a large bowl.  Dump almond bark on top and stir to coat.  Pour onto a parchment lined cookie sheet (or two) and let cool/harden.  

You'll notice all the ingredients are approximate.  This is what I used for this batch.  You could add in other things to this mix too.

• pretzels
• peanut butter chips
• any kind of nuts
• chocolate chips
• small candies like rolos or mini reeses

You'd need more almond bark depending on what and how much you add.  The possibilities are pretty endless though!  What would you put in your treat mix?

Iron Craft Challenge #24: Lego Ninjago Ornaments

It's been awhile since my last Iron Craft post.  Crafting has kind of taken a backseat to life at this point.  But I did do a project this time around that fit with the theme.  Each year we like to add one ornament to each kid's collection, with the goal of them having their own collection of ornaments when they grow up and move out on their own.  My parents did that, and it's a tradition I love!

I also like the ornaments to reflect something the kids are interested in (like these Thomas the Tank Engine ornaments made from toy trains from a few years ago).  This year the boys are really into Ninjago (that's Lego ninjas, if you're not in the Lego stage of life).  And there are really not a lot of options to buy Ninjago ornaments, unless you just hang the minifigures on the tree and call it an ornament.  

So I decided to make them.  I found a pattern for keychains here.

I used the trick of using a gluestick to glue the paper pattern to the felt, which I think I learned from the Iron Craft-y ladies.  It peels right off, but it sticks while you're cutting.  Then I followed the directions to stitch the details on these guys.  I sewed a ribbon loop to the top and voila!

And then the boys hung them on the tree.  Hannah got a Rainbow Dash pony for her ornament, and I still have to find something for Elizabeth for this year.  Jesse bought a little Superman and Wonder Woman for us as well.  Ornaments for everyone!

Iron Craft Challenge #16: Summer Whites

I really thought a project for a color challenge would be easy to come up with.  And then we got one, and I drew a big fat blank.  Finally, last night, I looked at what materials I had that fit with the color, white.  White felt stood out, especially as something I could whip up quickly.  At this rate I'm going to have enough Christmas ornaments to decorate a whole tree, just from Iron Craft challenges!  But I like making them, and they're usually quick and easy.

I wanted to do a poofy tree with rounded branches, and I think I accomplished that.  I drew a pattern on felt, and cut it out.  I sewed the crystal beads (leftover from Challenge #1 this year) onto one side, then sewed the two sides together most of the way.  I flipped it right side out, stuffed it, and sewed up the rest of the seam.  And that was that!

How many Christmas ornaments am I up to now?  How many more challenges will I end up making them for?

Iron Craft Challenge #14: All Natural

I read the description for this challenge, to make something with natural materials, and I was stuck.  So I figured I would go with wood, because I have a big bag of old-fashioned clothespins, and a Christmas ornament, because that seems to be the kick I'm on lately.

I started with pretty simple materials: a couple wooden clothespins and a wooden circle bead, blue cloth, and hot glue.

 First I put together the baby.

 Then the Mary and Joseph.

 And the whole family!

 I call it my natural minimalist nativity scene.  Simple but cute!

Anyone else making Christmas ornaments in July?