Holiday Fun and New Traditions!

I hope everyone had a very fantastic holiday filled with laughter and love.  We had a great Christmas in our house.  I'm still trying to organize my apartment to accommodate all our new, wonderful additions we were so blessed to receive.  It's been a lot of work, but one by one I am re-organizing all our rooms.  I know it will feel great once it's finished.

I wanted to share a fun little activity we did during our Christmas clean up.  I found this activity on Pinterest.  It is more for younger toddlers, but it looked so fun I couldn't help myself.

It's a "Tunnel of Lights" made by punching a bunch of holes in a cardboard box and inserting the lights through the holes.  I just stabbed the box a bunch of times with a large nail ... think Dexter.  It was a fun little farewell to the last of the big boxes and holiday decor in our house for another year.  I think I had as much fun in the box as they did!

 I know a lot of families out there added the new Elf on a Shelf tradition to their homes.  I thought it was pretty cute and enjoyed watching all the things other people were doing with their elf.  We did not get an elf, but it got my wheels spinning.  I had a bunch of white furry fabric and some plastic eyeballs.  Aubrey also had a dream of throwing snowballs on Christmas morning and my son is completely ninja obsessed at the moment.  And when he is obsessed, so is Aubrey.  It all came together and a new Christmas tradition was born.

Meet the Ninja Snowballs!

These fuzzy little guys are so cute.  We ended up wrapping them each separately with a note that says, "I am a ninja snowball.  Throw me at someone!"  Next year, I doubt they will need a note ;).  I make sure to hand one out to each person in the family, so we all get a chance.  There is one that is bigger than the other three.  It was fun!  There were random snowball fights every day until I packed them up for next year.  No one was too happy about that.  I guess that means they were a success!

A Few Fun Festive Crafts! There's still time!

This year we have done a lot of homemade crafts for gifts and decorations.  I always have loved doing homemade crafts for gifts and holiday decor, but this year I've taken it to a whole new level.

I just wanted to share a couple fun decorations the kids and I have done for our home.  I will share a few of the fun gifts we made for the neighbors and friends soon.  I'd show you today, but I might spoil the surprise for someone ;).

Here is a fun craft you can do with the kids that might help them get out of your hair for a few minutes.  It is a printable nativity scene that the kids can color and cut out and then you glue the pieces onto toilet paper rolls.  I have been saving our empty rolls for a while now, but it won't take much more than a paper towel roll and a few toilet paper rolls.

Here is how ours came out:

Here is the link to the printable nativity scene and the instructions - Nativity Scene Printable


For myself, I found this adorable craft, make your own mistletoe kissing ball.  I had all the ingredients laying around, so I had to do it.  I am always looking for an excuse to cover my kids in kisses and I had a feeling this would be fun for both kids to AVOID getting kissed by one another.  Boy, was I right!  Daily, they are either standing under it and taunting the other person to come and kiss them and then running away or one is trying to drag the other underneath it.  Then there are those precious moments when they both find themselves under there together and cover one another with kisses.  Plus, I have been getting so much extra love and kisses from both of them,  I might leave it up all year long. :)  Here is my mistletoe:

Here is the link to the pattern - Mistletoe Kissing Ball Tutorial
The only suggestions I would like to add to the tutorial are:
1) When you cut the wavy lines between the two green rectangles, don't be afraid to go close to the edges.  I would leave only a half and inch to an inch of space.  I didn't cut mine too deep and it left me with a huge center when I glued the two halves together that was hard to fluff out and make it look full.
2) When you glue the two centers together, glue the ribbon in between the two halves of mistletoe.  I glued mine on top and after finishing, I think it would have been best to glue it in the center for extra support.


Then I have a couple special decorations that I have added to our tradition.  My cat of 15 years, Tomas, passed away in August.  I find myself missing her a lot this time of year.  She has always had her own stocking, a Christmas ornament for the tree, a special Christmas frame with a sweet kitten picture of her in her Christmas scarf, her Christmas scarf, and another little Christmas holly piece I used to put on her for "fun" torture.  As I pulled each piece out of the Christmas box it made me miss her that much more.  I am at peace with her parting because she was very ill and had lived a long happy life, and died peacefully and perfectly, but it doesn't stop me from loving her and missing her sweet face, her warmth, and her company on these cold winter nights.  I found a couple ways to honor her memory and keep her alive in spirit in our home each Christmas.

My Tomas statue that my mom bought me for my birthday after Tomas passed away.  Now my "Tomas" can still wear her scarf each and every year :).  This makes me very happy and comforts me.  Even our dog, Mississippi, stopped to take a long sniff ... I think she may miss Tomas the most.

This is a sign I had made for my garden.  I started creating this "safe space" on the patio for Tomas just before she passed away.  She loved being outside, but we are on a very busy road.  The garden is sparse right now because it's winter, but I hope it will be in full bloom with herbs this spring and my "Tomas" will be able to hang in the shade in spirit and enjoy the fresh air.  I decided to hang the other christmas piece I loved to dress her up torture with every year on this sign.

I hope you all are staying warm and are all finished with your shopping and are ready to enjoy the festivities, food, family and fun!!!  Happy Holidays!

It SNOWED!!!! California Style!

The kids have been dying to visit the snow this year.  Aubrey, my youngest, is convinced that when she wakes up on Christmas Day it will be snowing and she's going to go outside and make a snowman and throw snowballs after opening her presents.  I've been trying to explain to her that, short of a miracle, it's probably not going to happen!  Lucky for her, she has a creative Mom whose mind is always planning the next fun way I can take a shot making her dreams come true.  In this case, I couldn't get her real snow, but here is my fun take on bring some fake snow to her!

In other news .... I cleaned out all my old bill stubs from the last year and got them all nicely shredded and ready for recycling! ;0)

My homies chillin' in the snow!

My Little Snowman :)

I'm trying out a new Ice Princess hair-do

My buddy catching up on some reading in his igloo.

The kids have been having fun all evening throwing snowballs at each other, making snowmen, and snow angels.  I didn't have the heart to sweep it all up tonight.  They can play for one more day, but then I predict a warm front is going to move through sometime tomorrow afternoon and melt the snow away into the recycling bin.  

Hope you all are staying warm and finding ways to keep the kids happy and having fun this vacation!

Easy Way to Personalize Your Stockings

Just a quick fly by post.  I'm in the middle of last minute crafting craziness.  I haven't had much down time, but I wanted to share a cool thing I did to our plain old red and green stockings.

We have had these stockings for years.  Red for girls, green for boys.  I only see them once a year, so I've never felt the need for anything more fancy than that.  This year Bayne requested to have his name put on his.  Well, my little man has been very good this year, so I was happy to make that request happen.

I forgot to take before pictures of the stockings (I really need to get better about that!) and as usual, I only have my iPhone and not the best lighting, so the pictures aren't the best quality.  Here is the finished product!

Aubrey and Bayne

We don't have a fire place and I plan on painting this wall after the holidays, so I just nailed everything up there ... lol.  Gotta make due with what you have.

I messed mine up.  I thought it would be cool to put the names the other direction, since we were hanging them opposite the kids.  It worked for Mom, but when I tried to do Pops in the direction I did Mom I realized it would look backward and wrong.  Oh well, Mom has always been a little odd.

This is so easy to do and it doesn't require any sewing.  Just an iron and some scissors.  I used the computer to make a template for the letters.  I just went into Word and found a cool font and printed the letters I needed in a large size.

Then you trace the letters in reverse on the back of heat bond (pictured below).  Be sure to get the red, no- sew package.  Get a piece of felt, any color you choose (I used white) and iron the heat bond letters to the back of the felt.  After it cools, cut out the letters and peel off the paper backing and iron onto the stocking.

Red package of heat bond - no sew

And there you have it!  I now have a happy little boy and some cool upgraded personalized stockings I can use year after year.  And best of all ... there will be no arguing over whose stocking is whose ... peace on Earth, good will toward men.   Merry Christmas Everyone!

Advent Calendar

Everyone sees the Advent Calendars popping up in the stores around this time of year.  I remember them fondly.  Cute little cardboard Santa box with little flaps you can open up for a surprise 20 year old crappy piece of chocolate from God knows where.  Somewhere in the last 30 years the magic of them has worn off and left me with the reality of wondering how long that chocolate has actually been sitting inside those little cardboard flaps.  I mean, some of those Advent Calendars looks incredibly similar to the ones I had when I was a kid ... coincidence ..... maybe, but I'm not about to try it out on my kids.

I started looking for a cute Advent Calandar idea that I could make and stuff myself.  I stumbled upon the most adorable and EASY calendar at All Sorts, an amazing blog - and if you click on the link you will find a tutorial for this cute calendar!  Be warned, though, her sight is serious eye candy!  I got lost on her blog for hours.  Here is her cute little Advent Calendar made from felt, embroidery thread, buttons, and ribbon or fabric scraps.

She has hers hung beautifully in the background over the fireplace

I cannot take a very nice photo of mine with my little iPhone camera and poor lighting, not to mention I have no fireplace or fancy decor in my little humble apartment, but I will share my finished product anyway.  Just believe me when I say the look adorable in person :)!

I had to hang the high and above the sewing table, so little sneaky hands can't get into them when I am distracted.

I didn't want to pass out chocolate every day of the week or spoil them with toys each day and set a precedent for coming years.  I was going to do lego mini figures, but those can be expensive.  I had already purchased a bunch of stocking stuffers for the kids and one of them was these tiny little Pokemon figures I ordered off ebay from Japan.  My kids LOVE Pokemon and little figures seem to be all the rage these days.  I dug them out and they couldn't be more perfect.  There were exactly 48 and 2 fit just perfectly in the small envelopes (which I made a tiny bit wider than she did).  That way each day one kid is the first to stick their hand in the envelope and pick the first mystery Pokemon and then the other kid gets the other one.  It has been a big hit!  They have fun going to Pokemon.com and looking up their characters in the Pokedex. 

Bayne's Pokemon

Aubrey's Pokemon

My next fun craft is to make shoe box scenes for the kids to play with their characters on.  I can't wait to see what we come up with.  I will share once we are finished.  

Happy Holidays!!!

Another Fabric Card

Remember how I said I was going to make another fabric art card for my Mom in my previous post?

Well here it is!!!  

The big dolphin is supposed to be her and her pod is my brother, my children, and me.  

She taught us all how to swim in this big old ocean called life.

I love you Mom!  Happy Birthday!

Thanksgiving in Pictures

Clean up crew and taste tester - Mississippi

Missing my kitty this Thanksgiving.  I kept worrying about the butter.   I hope you got to lick a whole tub of it in heaven, Tomas!

Pumpkin chocolate chip bread with buttercream frosting

Appetizers - olives, pistachios, macadamia nuts, carrots, celery, ranch, and chips

Toasted sourdough with sautéed leeks and blue cheese.  I added bacon crumbles for the meat eaters.

Italian red wine and salad with red leaf lettuce, roasted butternut squash with poppy seeds, pomegranate seeds, scallions, and home made dressing.  Avocado and bacon crumbles for extra toppings.

                                             

Homemade cranberry sauce and corn

Momma's yummy stuffing and sweet potato casserole

Tofurky and gravy

My cute little handmade placemats and napkins

My family!

Yummy apple, pear, and cherry fruit crisp

My beloved pumpkin pie cheesecake!