Advent Calendar Pieces

We finally got the ornaments sewn up for our handmade Advent Calendar.  Here are the felt ornaments to hang on our Advent Calendar next year!  Brace yourself for the picture overload. They are so cute, only 2.5 inches big, and hand and machine-sewn.  They are made with felt and embroidery thread- that's it!

 We created each one of these without a pattern. They are freehand cut,hand and  machine stitched together. Details are hand-embroidered.

 We had so many great ideas for ornaments that we just couldn't stop at 25.

 They are all so adorable.  The children are going to love finding them in our calendar pockets next December!

 Kenna and Quinn's stocking.   I wonder if we'll need more stockings in the future? :)

 Closeup of the Pointsetta, the Star for the top of the tree, some holly, and a mitten.

 Amazing little drum!

 My favorites are the soldier and the fireplace. Look at his tiny belt, and his chin strap!! Also in this picture is a cup of cooca and an ice skate.

 The fireplace has a ton of tiny details. Look at the tiny fire!

 Frosty, reindeer, a "jingle bell" and the drum.

Candle, gingerbread man, cardinal, sugar cookie

With these ornaments finally finished, I feel like our advent calendar has transformed into an instant family heirloom.  Might be planning on making three more- for our cousins, and possibly a few to sell for 2012!

The Fun Rundown Jan 12

 I had a few pictures lurking around that were cute, and showed us doing fun things, but none were enough for an entire post, so I am cheating and combining them.
Above is Quinn (6months) playing in a giant water table at a local science museum.

 She loves to splish and splash. 

 Kenna (35 months)  and I built and huddled in a fort (in another area of the museum).  The giant poles, attaching easily with velro, and the lightweight material made for some really fun toddler work. She was very specific about where everything should go. We could have done this for hours. She's been completely entralled with everything "fort" and so this addressed her high interest level perfectly!

 Quinn, playing dress up. She loves peek-a-boo and this hat was new and different than playsilks and blankets.

 Little Man is taking steps! (15 months) All of his therapists are beside themselves with happiness.  He loves walking and is really getting brave.  Of course, two days after he took his first steps we got an appointment to get him special shoes, inserts and braces, but that's a small price to pay to get to say my CP kid is WALKING!!  Here he is attempting to push a basket full of sisters. (notice Daddy has ahold of the other end with a belt, so Little Man feels like a rock star!)

Kenna showed immense joy in watching our 6 foot giant inflatable snowman inflate and collapse each day. Pure joy. I wish we could leave that thing up all year. (Don't worry, I've finally packed up the Christmas. Why is it that even when you think you've gotten all the decor packed up, you suddenly sit on the couch and notice a GIANT Santa bowl you missed. Um, how is that possible?)

Paperless Christmas

 Felt bags instead of wrapping paper, anyone?

 How about bags mde from old t-shirts, and embellished with felt?

 Not a gift under the tree wrapped in paper! My handy husband Bill sewed up some felt bags, and I tucked in our gifts and tied them up with ribbon. 

 This gift (k-cups for Bill) came in this brown bag, so I just prettied it up with a ribbon.

 Bill and I didn't want to buy anything special for this project, so some of our bags are yellow felt, as opposed to more "christmassy" colors. I didn't mind one bit. :)

 I even grabbed some scraps of fabric for some gifts, and wrapped them up!

 Stockings are filled by Santa at our house, and of course, those gifts are "wrapped" by the stocking, so no need for anything else!

Santa left some gifts unwrapped, like our coffee maker, and Kenna's CitiBlocks. He even played around with them and built a tower!
After gifts were open, I folded all of the bags, tucked them and all the ribbon into one of the largest bags, and, well... that was it! Wrapping with fabric was fun and easy, and so good for the environment. Next year we are going to try and have a completely handmade Christmas (only some items were handmade this year, but they were the favorite gifts!). We did have a plastic-free Christmas, though. I should take pictures of all of the amazing wooden gifts the kids got. No promises...

Christmas Craftiness

We have been doing a lot of Christmas crafts around here. One a day, to be precise. Which means I should have 15 crafts to share with you by now. Sadly, I have far less than that.  My main excuse is that I have three kids under three, and my hands are too full to do a craft and operate a camera.

Here is some of what we have done! 8 out of 15 ain't bad, people!!

 Salt Dough Ornaments- posted about these HERE. (And technically, we did this over two days- one day of baking, one day of painting...so we are up to 9 crafts!)

 Raindeer Cinnamon Stick.  This is easy and takes some great fine-motor work. Curl a pipe cleaner for antlers. Glue on a tiny pompom nose and eyes. Thread a bell onto red ribbon or a bit of floral wire (or a bread twisty tie or even a pipe cleaner). Draw on a mouth.

 I love this picture- Kenna is trying to thread the bell onto floral wire, and our cat Waffles is patiently watching. I can't tell you how often he sits and does "learning" with Kenna. He's the sweetest cat.

 Classic Snowman Snow Measuring stick. Early morning paint a paint stirrer white(Free from hardware store). Once dry, glue on the details. We used stiff felt to cut out a hat (Kenna cut it herself!) She cut a carrot nose out of foam, and glued on two tiny eyes. I wanted to draw a mouth with a sharpie, but she asked me to cut a smile mouth out of stiff felt.  I used a small strip of fleece to make a scarf. The indent of the paint stirrer makes a perfect neck.

 When all the details were dried, we lined up the stick with a ruler, and ticked off each inch. Kenna helped count and identify numbers. She isn't quite sure what the stick is for yet... wait til it snows and we go and measure how deep it is! It'll be so exciting! (I ambitiously numbered our snowman measuring stick to 8 inches... LOL)

 Foam stocking with foamie decoative stickers

 Tape art. I wanted to do some tape relief- where we tape, paint, and then peel off the tape to see the pattern. Kenna was so absorbed in pulling off pieces of tape and placing them on the paper, I decided to skip the painting this time. I forgot how much fun tape could be! We have a few rolls of Shurtape- colored, not-so-sticky tape- from my days as a teacher. The company(local to us) had donated a gabillion colored rolls to the school, so each teacher has a lovely stash for crafts and things.

 Handprint Santas. I did this with Kenna, and need to take time to do it with the babies (I think I need Handy Husband to help though- babies and painted hands are a recipe for disaster!!) I painted Kenna's palm "peach" and her fingers red. She stamped a couple prints, and then when it dried I added the details. Ho Ho Ho! (or as Kenna says, Yo Ho Ho! Apparently Santa is part pirate.)

Our lovely Cone trees, as seen here...

And finally, some more foam art, which I have to admit, she loves. Kenna loves stickers. It's so easy, and she loves it. That makes me happy.
If I find pictures of more Christmas Craftiness, I promise I'll add them here. There are sure to be at least 5 more crafts lurking around... Oh, I also promise to try really hard to remember to take pictures of the crafts we do each day for the rest of the month. 

Salt Dough Ornaments

 Today was Kenna's first time using Acrylic Paint. I was feeling stupid brave, and the babies were sleeping, so we got to work painting our Salt Dough Ornaments. Could have sworn I took pictures of us baking them, but they are nowhere to be found. We made a big batch of dough, rolled it out ,and used cookie cutters to make festive shapes. I used a skewer to poke holes in the ornaments before we baked them, so we can string them and hang them.  We ended up with a TON of ornaments- like 30 or more. We are going to be gifting these well into the new year. Happy Easter- Have a Gingerbread Man. :)

 

 Needless to say, there were plenty for me to paint as well. I am not artisic, and can't paint, but I had fun with this.

 To say Kenna enjoyed painting is a bit of an understatement. The girl focused on this activity for almost an hour. And then after nap, painted some more. She LOVED having access to 6 colors at one time. She loved dipping her brush in the water, swirling it around, and wiping it on the towel. She loved this.  She also loved mixing the colors to come up with new ones.

 It wasn't as messy as I feared. She didn't paint herself (I explained the rules) and she didn't splatter paint everwhere. Phew. I hate it when a fun project turns into a nightmare!

 What really cracked me up about this was that she was alternating between just two ornaments, but they dried quickly, and then she would completly change their color! That circle was blue, then white, then purple, then red and green.

 Aren't they lovely? Oh, I have to point out that this Gingerbread man was rolled and cut by Kenna. Then she requested that the hole to string it be on his foot. She thinks," it's silly to hang by your head- he should hang by his foot." Wise child.

Here are a few that I did for the grandparents.  Quinn's little hand fit perfectly on the circle. Little Man's palm is so chunky it cracks me up. Daddy calls it "meaty." Kenna's big girl hand didn't fit at all, so I just did her fingers. I loved this idea I found on Pinterest to make each finger a little snowman.
*Note- I was being stubborn and wanted all the circles to be the same size. In retrospect, I should have just started with a bigger circle.

When the paint was dry, I hit the ornaments with a light coat of clear sealant. Now they will hopefully last for years to come!

Light Box- Snowy fun

 I got a great idea from Play at Home Mom- put some polyfil pellets in a clear bucket, set it on the light table, and watch the fun begin!!  We started out with a shoebox sized container, because that's what I had on hand at the moment.

 With the flash on, you can see the awesomeness that is polyfil pellets!! :) If your kids hands are clean, the pellets roll right off. If they are dirty/sticky/slimy, the pellets will coat their hands. Then the sticky child will try and shake their hands to get the pellets off, spraying pellets everywhere.
You've been warned.

 Our buddy who comes to play on Wednesdays liked the tub, too. He's 22 months, and tried to eat the pellets at first, but got the idea by the end that we were playing, not snacking.

 I used too small a tub the first time I set the pellets out- Kenna seemed intent on swimming in them but could only get her elbows in, so I got a larger rubbermaid tub the second day. I also added some Christmas erasers and a couple glass jars for scooping.

 Aglow on the light table.

 So, of course, she wanted to sit in it! She explored the texture with her hands, her feet, her knees, and her bottom. She spun in circles and she tried to bury her feet. She LOVED this!

 Quinn is 6 months old now, and of course wanted a turn in the texture tub!

 She was fascinated by the texture, and did a lot of splashing in it, like the gestures she does in the tub.

Pellets were everywhere. It was awesome. (a sheet under the bin made for quick clean-up.)

 Baby fun! And she never once tried to eat them. I was surprised. Little Man (15 months) got a turn after he woke up from nap, and the first thing he did was eat a handful.  Awesome. (Yes, they are non-toxic. And yes, I strongly encouraged him not to do that again. And yes, he did it again.)

 A closeup of the erasers (From Oriental Trading) that I threw into the tub to make it merry and bright.

Kenna loved this. The beads are a smooth and soft texture, and they plink in a lovely way when they fall. The light box just makes it more fun and magical.  We love our lightbox.
We made ours for $7.00!

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