Geometric Tree Topper DIY

Every year I have lamented the fact that we don't actually have an official tree topper (or tree skirt!).  I didn't want something too flashy or busy, and haven't been able to find one that fits the bill. The other night I was sorting through my stash, and came across a few remaining packs of brass tubing leftover from this project, and before I knew it, a tree topper was in the works...

I found an amazing tutorial for a star himmeli here (complete with video!), and went to it!Well, turns out that regular string and brass tubing will not achieve a perfect star shape, and instead will result in a lame heap of sad limp tubing that does not say "merry Christmas." So, I tried it again using thin jewelry wire instead of string and it worked!

Perhaps you are in need of a tree topper too? If you'd like to make one of your own, follow the tutorial, substituting thin wire in place of string, and using needle nose pliers to tuck in and finish each end of wire that sticks out. I also used a small piece of wire to attach our star to the top of our tree.

Merry, merry making to you!

Picture Book Advent Calendar.

This week I wrapped up 24 special books... In addition to our event based advent calendar, we are doing a picture book advent this year and I am a LITTLE excited! I have a huge love for children's literature and illustrations. Basically, my wishlist had grown so huge this year that I decided to purchase all of the books I've been wanting to add to our library, but wait until December to give them to my kids. This is not an inexpensive advent idea, but these books will count as a big part of their gifts from us this year. They have really taken a shine to reading recently and I could not be happier about it.

I chose books that are old, and some that are new. Some I've read before, but others I will be excited to read for the first time when we open them. In case you're looking for book ideas for Christmas, here's a small sampling of the books we chose...

The Day the Crayons Quit by Drew Daywalt
This Moose Belongs to Me by Oliver Jeffers
Friends by Eric Carle
God Gave Us You by Lisa Tawn Bergren
The Bear's Song by Benjamin Chaud
Extra Yarn by Mac Barnett
Matthew's Dream by Leo Lionni
People by Blexbolex
Wherever You Are, My Love Will Find You by Nancy Tillman

I can't wait to see their faces when they find out what's inside each one! Do you have any special plans up your sleeve for December?

Thankful Mr. Turkey (a printable for kids).

I love this time of year! Things are starting to twinkle, children are dressed as adorable pilgrims, and everyone is bringing out the good food and china (yum!). Candy canes and mistletoe are just around the corner....

My girls celebrated Thanksgiving last week at school. I made a simple craft for my daughter's Kindergarten class and I thought I would share it with you. In case you need one more thing to keep them busy at turkey time...

You will need to gather:

Turkey/feather printable
Scissors
Construction Paper in various colors
A large brad
Crayons or markers

Cut the feathers out from the template and set aside. Cut a feather shape in varying sizes out of construction paper (we cut five different ones). Layer the feathers on top of one another and poke the brad through near the bottom middle. Attach feathers to turkey by sticking it through near the middle of the turkey's body.

Fan the feathers out and write or draw what you're thankful for on each one!

Our Gratitude Tree

I'm sharing a new tradition over at Playful Learning today! Do you have any special traditions that are centered around Thanksgiving? Last year we made this garland one afternoon. It was fun to focus on what we are thankful for, rather than what we want for a while. I liked the idea so much that we decided to make a month long list of gratitude in the form of a gratitude tree. You can read more about it here.

Holiday crafts with Kids: Frosted Windows

I'm over at Playful Learning today sharing the second installment of my Holiday Crafts for Kids series. Did you know you can grow salt crystals on your windows? The end result looks a lot like icy winter frost. We tried it out this week and my girls loved it! Check out my post here to find out how it's done.

Stitched with love (downloadable tags)

I really loved how the stitched banner from E's party turned out last week. I loved it so much, that I decided to stretch the idea further and design a few stitched tags to put on our gifts this year.

Want to make some of your own? Just download the tags at the bottom of this post and cut them out. Then simply punch a hole with a small hole punch on the ends of each line. Choose some embroidery thread and a large needle and get stitchin'! Add a hole to the top of the tags when you're done.

You can download the tags here. I've also included a download of the banner here. If you decide to make some, please share! I'd love to see them.

Happy weekend and happy gift wrapping!

*As always, feel free to share this project, but please send people to the original source to receive the download link. Thank you!

A Gingerbread Party

E turned 5 this past week! She told us she wanted a "friend" party for the first time this year. Somehow (still not sure how!), I was able to distract her from the purple/pink/princess theme that seems to surface in every area of her life. Thus, the idea for a holiday themed gingerbread party was slowly unearthed.

Making gingerbread houses from scratch for 10+ kids may seem like a crazy idea, but you don't know my Mom (aka Nana). She's a wiz at baking and happened to be in town last week. I designed a template, cut it out of a used cereal box, and she took it from there. Once the pieces were baked, we all chipped in to put the miniature houses together. I love how (most of them) turned out!!

The decor was a bit more simple than my usual pile-it-on style of planning parties, but things seemed just about right. A few red paper fans, a stitched garland, and candy-cane striped paper to cover the table. Miniature bottle brush trees and jars of candy served as centerpieces. I also put a few of the trees into glass bowls with fake snow and glitter.

Each child was given a house and a bowl full of icing. The kids had fun dipping the various candy into the icing and then sticking it to their houses. We definitely learned a lesson about hard candy not sticking very well to gingerbread-oops!

We also played "hot potato" with a Christmas ornament/Christmas music, pin the nose on the reindeer (remember this fawn from here?), and had a marshmallow toss. We ended everything with cake, of course!

Happy Birthday Ellie! We love you so much!

Holiday Crafts with Kids: Paper Trees

This has been the first year that my kids have been interested in "helping out" with the whole Christmas set up. Our holiday decor has been pretty minimalistic this year, so there hasn't been much for them to do. Also, wood floors + glass ornaments + a two and five year old= a lot of potential for disaster.

I've tried to come up with a few crafts they can help me with over the next few weeks, the first being these little paper trees, now proudly displayed in our entry way. This craft was still a little bit hard for A, who's not yet three, but E was able to do it with no problems.

Click over to my post at Playful Learning for more details and pictures! I'm curious, how do you get your children involved during this season?

Handmade Christmas: Little Village Advent Calendar

Do you count down the days until Christmas with an advent calendar? I didn't grow using one, but this is our third year doing it with our girls. I'm a huge Christmas nerd, so I love the idea of doing something to get into the spirit everyday. I want Christmas in our home to be about so much more than just presents.

I had the idea for this advent a few months ago, but it's taken me forever to complete thanks to a certain little baby I know. It's finally done and I LOVE it! We set it up on our mantel yesterday and the girls are going crazy asking when we're going to start. Each little house has a slip of paper with a suggested activity, plus a few tiny treats.

If you're waiting until the last minute to put together your advent calendar like me, you're welcome to use my designs to create your own little village. You can find the templates for all three house sizes as well as the numbers at the end of this post.

To make the houses: download templates and print 8 of each size of house on to thick paper. Using a ruler and the tip of a bone folder (or an exacto knife), lightly score all lines (except the chimney!). Use your tool to make an actual slit/cut on the bold lines (there are 5). Fold paper inward on the lines, and place your little treats in the center of the box.  Bring sides of the house up, fitting tabs into slits on all sides of the house, finishing with the roof. Print the numbers on to full sheet label paper and cut out (I used a 1" circle punch to make things easier). Peel and stick to the front of each house, and enjoy spoiling your kids for 24 whole days!

Templates: Advent numbers, Large House, Medium House, Small House

Handmade Christmas: Wooden wall tree.

Hello! How was your Thanksgiving? We had a great time relaxing and (over)eating with family. Now I'm ready to dive head first into Christmas. There's something about being in our first house and actually having the space to decorate that's giving me all sorts of ideas. I thought I would share a few with you over the next couple of weeks.

First up: an easy wooden wall tree! I plan to use mine to hang the Christmas cards that will be rolling in soon, but the tree could also be used to hang lights and ornaments, perhaps even in place of a bigger tree.

I didn't take any pictures of the process, but I'll explain what I did. I bought six thin pieces of balsa wood from the craft store and cut them into various sizes (you can buy a little razor saw in the wood section, but I just used my Exacto knife and a metal ruler to "saw" through the thin wood and it worked just fine). I then arranged them until I was happy with the look and glued everything together with a hot glue gun.

To make one of your own you'll need:
1 36" x 1/2" piece of balsa
3 24" x 3/8" pieces of balsa
2 24" x 1/4" pieces of balsa
Exacto knife
Metal ruler
Glue gun
Thumbtack/twine (to hang)

1. Cut your wood: Using your ruler and Exacto knife, cut two of your 24" x 3/8" pieces of balsa in half, forming four branches measuring 12" each. Cut the remaining 24" x 3/8" piece into thirds, forming three branches measuring 8" each. Cut one of your 24" x 1/4" pieces of balsa into 4" pieces, forming six branches. Take your second piece of 24" x 1/4" balsa and cut four more 4" branches. Use the remaining 8" of wood to cut four 2" branches. 2. Arrange: Lay your biggest piece of wood (36" x 1/2") out on the floor and arrange your branches coming off of it. Play around with it until you're happy with the results. 3. Glue: Use a glue gun to attach all the branches. You only need a little bit per branch! 4. Hang: Tie a piece of twine into a loop. Wrap twine around a push pin and stick the pin through the top of your tree. Hang and decorate!

Last minute Thanksgiving garland.

I have mixed feelings about decorating for Thanksgiving. We don't currently host any gatherings, and I tend to save everything for the "big show" (putting up the Christmas decorations the day after). While working on another project yesterday, I had a bunch of 1" wide paper scraps left over, so I decided to make a little Thanksgiving garland after all.

To make, take 1" strips of paper (they can be any length), fold over the top, punch with a hole punch and secure with a brad. Cut a triangle out of the bottom of each strip to make a flag shape. This morning we talked about what we were thankful for. Things such as blankies, milk, and Zeke (our dog). We wrote one thing on each slip of paper and then strung them up on some jute string. So easy, right?

P.S.-I promise she was having fun before I took this picture!

Fall treats: Mini apple galettes.

Fall is in full swing here! The days are proving to be dark and wet, but cozy too. There's nothing better than a warm treat on a chilly day, and these little hand pies certainly do the trick! We had a ton of apples left over from our event, so I decided we needed to bake up something quick. I'm still working to perfect these guys, but I thought I would share the recipe in case you're in need of a warm treat too.

Have I told you how great the neighbors are in our new neighborhood? Good people lining both sides of the street. They even get together every Sunday for coffee-the whole street is invited. I'm thinking the second batch of galettes needs to be wrapped in parchment and shared with these kind-hearted people. So much better than Halloween candy (well, maybe)!

What is your favorite treat to eat on a drizzly day?

Mini Apple Galette

Gather:

Pie crust dough for 9 in. pie (dough will make two galettes)

5-6 apples-cored, peeled, and cut into thin slices

1/2 cup brown sugar

Pinch of salt

1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon

1/4 tsp. lemon zest

Egg wash (mix one egg with about 1 tbl. water)

Sugar, for dusting

Make:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

 Divide dough into two balls. Roll out into two circles on a floured surface.

Line a cookie sheet with parchment and place two dough circles on sheet.

In a large bowl mix apples, b. sugar, salt, cinnamon, and zest (filling will make about four galettes)

Heap a pile of apples in the center of each dough round and fold the edges up and over.

Brush dough with egg wash and dust generously with sugar.

Cut a small piece of foil and "tent" it over the apples (this will help them cook through).

Pop 'em in the oven for 30 min, then lower temp. to 350 and cook another 30 min.

Take off foil and bake for another 10 min. or until brown on top.

Hand-stamped wrapping paper.

September is a month of birthdays for us. I'm a little behind, but have been trying to catch up this week. I selected a few small things to send to a faraway friend before realizing I somehow have no wrapping paper, bags, or boxes in this house (a rare thing!).

Yesterday everyone was calm enough to allow me a tiny sliver of time to create-and I used it to get on the floor with some pieces of plain brown packing paper, a pencil eraser, and a black ink pad.

So simple, fun, and addicting! If I had been able to locate my exacto I could've changed things up by cutting the eraser into a triangle or something similar. What about you? Have you ever improvised when it comes to wrapping gifts?