Christmas Tree Bows

In honour of Katrina's 1st Birthday, I decided to make pink bows for our Christmas tree. We're going to make this a tradition since her birthday is in early December. This way, I can get Christmas decorations up early without feeling like it's "taking over" her birthday. We'll have a pink tree for a week or so, until her birthday, and then we'll start decorating it for Christmas :)


I looked up how to tie a simple bow, on the Martha Stewart website, here. (It's funny- I can tie a nice bow in a sash, but when the ribbon wasn't already attached to something, I had to google the right method, to get it right!). Then I threaded a twist tie through the back of each bow, to secure it onto the tree.

I was really happy with the result! I think I may have to buy some nice Christmas ribbon for the tree during Christmas time, because I really like the way bows look on the tree!

Unfortunately, I didn't pay attention to how much ribbon I bought- just that I got two spools... not sure how much was on each one! (And I didn't get the back corner of the tree completed, but you can't tell anyway ;)

I would definitely recommend using ribbon with some good wire on the edges, to keep the shape of the bow!

Christmas Trees

Talia made a couple of Christmas trees today:
I cut out a Christmas Tree shape from a cereal box-type of cardboard, and Talia
- painted it green
- painted the stump pink/red
- realized mixing red with green made brown, and experimented - decorated the tree with stickers and sequins
- made it "rain" sequins
- spent FOREVER cleaning up the sequins
I also made a little green paper cone out of construction paper for her (I got the idea from Ikat, through The Crafty Crow, where you can find a bunch of cute advent ideas here) and let her decorate it
- she loved using pom poms because she saw them days ago & has been waiting for her chance to use them! Here's what Katrina got to do while Talia was painting (I tried letting her at the finger paint at first, but it went in her mouth so fast, I quickly changed the plan & let her at some babyfood instead! :)
I have a feeling that cardboard tree will continue to get more and more decorated as the days go on. I'm also planning to make a larger version of it with her as we get closer to Christmas.

Me, Sew??

I cannot tell you how much Ikat's blog makes me wish I sewed!

My friend, Cheryl, recently made a Black Apple Doll (you can find the pattern here, on the Martha Stewart Website) for her daughter, and I am dying to make one!

I didn't think I would ever be interested in sewing, and maybe I won't be interested in sewing clothing, but I am definitely starting to feel interested in sewing other things!!

Because a post is more interesting with a photo, here's a picture of one thing I have sewn, for Talia when she was closer to Katrina's age:



It's a "touchy feely blanket" that I made out of fun-feeling fabrics. Katrina loves it now, but unfortunately the fringe tends to unravel, so I don't feel like it's the safest toy! If I ever make another, I'll be more careful about what I use.

Almost every item I have ever sewn has been with the help or guidance of my mom who is a talented seamstress :)

Paper Puppet Christmas Pageant

My parents were recently getting rid of a ton of "The Friend" magazines that they had collected over the years. I gladly accepted a box full of them, to use for pictures to cut out for different projects with Talia.

They came in handy this week for another use, as well! I started searching the internet for some fun, religious, Christmas activities to do with Talia. It was hard to find good ones! (If you have any, or any links to a good resource, please point me to them in the comments!!)
So, I searched through the box of magazines and pulled out all of the December issues. I found today's activity in the December 1995 issue! While you can find that issue online, the illustrations aren't available that far back. However, you can find illustrations and activities to print out in the more recent issues if you go to this website (they're organized by date).

Here's what we did:

- I glued the pages onto cardstock
- I cut the pictures out
- I laminated them
- I cut them out
- I used a gluegun to glue the sticks on
- We discussed the story of Jesus' birth
- Talia played!

I'm glad I decided to laminate them, because I'm hoping they'll last long enough to actually pack them away with the Christmas stuff and use them again next year!

Here's Talia, finding new & exciting uses for the popsicle sticks while waiting for me to finish my part in the craft... note: the dye used for popsicle sticks WILL come off when moistened... ahem.

Here are some scriptures that can be used for Family Home Evening, if you want to do a Puppet Christmas Pageant:

- Christmas in America

Helaman 14:1-5, 3 Nephi 1:4-21

- The Birth of Jesus Christ

Luke 2:1-7

- Glad Tidings of Great Joy
Luke 2:8-20

- Wise Men from the East

Matthew 2:1-12

Wrapping CDs

As mentioned in one of the wrapping paper posts, we are wrapping Christmas CDs this year, to open one each day as Christmas gets closer.

It's a great advent-ish thing to do, and lets your kids open something before Christmas.

I hope to be able to do this with Christmas books one year when we have enough of them! (We wrapped a few this time).

Bubble Wrapping Paper

The second way that we made wrapping paper was a lot of fun! It's a neat effect, and it's pretty easy to do with what you have on hand at home. (And what preschooler doesn't love blowing bubbles with a straw???!)


What You'll Need:

- shallow dish
- cup of water
- food colouring
- tsp. of dishsoap
- straw
- white paper

What To Do:

pour water, colouring, and soap into dish. Stir.

Blow bubbles with straw until they come above top of dish.

Touch paper to bubbles, repeat until paper is covered.

Let bubbles pop & let paper dry.

Voila!

Homemade Wrapping Paper

In my blog-searching, I came across the idea to wrap up all of your Christmas books and put them under your tree. Then your kids get to choose one book to unwrap each day leading up to Christmas, and you read a book each day.

I think this is a great idea, because it lets your kids unwrap things before Christmas! It also adds a little more excitement to reading the books. Unfortunately, we don't have very many Christmas books! However, we do have quite a few Christmas CDs, so I'm going to try this with music this year.

So, this morning I rolled out our big paper (a roll we got at Ikea for $10- it has come in SO handy, SO many times!) and we decorated it with red and green crayons, Christmas stickers, etc. We're going to use it to wrap the CDs later.