my blog

christmas eve.

Our family looks forward to lots of great traditions on Christmas Eve. We watch a fun Christmas movie and stuff ourselves silly with candy, pop, sausage rolls, chips and cookies.  We watched The Search for Santa Paws this year, and even I thought it was adorable.

After the movie ends, we change into our new Christmas jammies, and of course the obligatory picture in front of the tree. Ours was more of a comedy show this year… everyone wanted to hold Finn, make funny faces, or just run away when the opportunity presented itself.

We tried standing…

and sitting…

At least Darren didn’t run away when I took his picture.

After that, we settled down to track Santa on the computer using Norad.

I love Christmas Eve, because it’s the one night of the year, you don’t have to argue over bedtime, everyone is more than willing to go to sleep.

milk and cookies.

I’m off to a very slow start this year with all the Christmas festivities at our house, but last night we managed to squeeze in a very fun milk and cookies party.

I had spent the day making various batches of cookies for the kids to sample, along with 3 different kinds of milk.

And who, might you say were we taste testing for…?

Well, Santa of course.

The cookies…

Rainbow sprinkle cookies, homemade chocolate chip, chocolate peanut butter and mini dunkers (store bought).

And the milk…

I made little tags to go on each of the mini jug handles- 2% milk, Chocolate milk and Eggnog. (the tag got cut off the pic, sorry)

The cups that they drank the milk out of had Oreo cookie straws, which I will admit are super yummy!!

We had little shooter glasses of milk with mini cookie chasers. (Don’t worry, they were cute, I am not teaching my kids how to be early alcoholics☺)

The kids each got to choose which of the milk and cookies were their favorite to leave for Santa on Christmas Eve. I don’t have to tell you which was their favorite drink…

And the cookie that won…

Well, I guess nothing can top Mom’s homemade chocolate chip cookies.

We also watched this movie along with our milk and cookie snack.

A-dorable!!!

more gift ideas.

It's really beginning to look like Santa's workshop at my house. I have 6 crafting projects on the go right now, and the mess to prove it. My deadlines are fast approaching (Sunday for some, Tuesday for the rest) and I'm thrilled to knock one more thing off my to do list.

If you remember last year, I made these cute little cookie cutter frosting sets for the women I Visit Teach through Church.

This is what I came up with this year. (Actually the original idea spread like a bad rash and ended up being nothing like what I planned)

I wanted to do some cute little hot chocolate in a mug, with a candy cane stir sticks and marshmallows, so I found some cute little mugs. I didn't know which one would work, since one has a wider mouth than the other. So I bought them both to try. (Dollar Store)

Then when I was trying to fit the hot chocolate and all the goodies in, it just wasn't looking right. So I ended up making a sweet little paper carrier to put it all in.

(I'll break down the parts to make this for you...) 

Start by taking jumbo marshmallows and sticking a lollipop stick in the bottom.  Melt some chocolate and dip the marshmallow in about halfway. Stand the sticks in something that will hold them upright until the chocolate sets. (I used my salt container)

I wrapped each marshmallow (once the chocolate set) in cellophane and tied it with curling ribbon. Just in case you're wondering what these are for, they are to stir into your hot chocolate and the marshmallow gets all melty and delish!

Each little milk box is made out of kraft cardstock. The first one holds two little packages of hot chocolate mix.

 
 If you google milk carton template, you will find lots of free ones to download. But I used the one from the Papertrey website, which you can buy here. (I wouldn't feel right sharing it here, since well, it's not very nice and slightly illegal, but anyways) The free templates I found are slightly different from the one I used, but they will still work just the same.

Okay, so the other milk box, all I did was cut the top off where it folds into a carton. Cut a window out of the front and add some cellophane to "cover" the hole.

Along with the marshmallow stir sticks, I included crushed candy canes in a little zip-lock bag to sprinkle on top of your hot chocolate.

The carrier itself is included in the milk carton download from Papertrey. It too is made from paper and super easy to assemble.

Front View.

 
Side View.

See, super simple, but so adorable. And very inexpensive as I try to do with most of my projects. You could probably make these for about $1-2 each, not including the template download which was $5.

I like to look at this and think of all sorts of different ways I could stuff these little boxes. The possibilities are endless!

  
  

handmade christmas.

It's December, already.

wow.

I can't say I didn't know it was coming, after all it does come every year, faithfully after November 30th, I just can't believe how fast it's moving.

So as you may or may not know, I like to make stuff. And this Christmas is no exception for my handmade gifts. The only problem is, that I want to share them with you, but I don't want the recipient to see them before hand.

What's a girl to do?

Well, I'm going on the honesty of my family and friends that they won't peek. I hope that you will have better restraint than I would have. And I'll won't post pictures in the post, instead I'll make an album that you won't be quite so tempted to go and look at. But we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. Today we'll start real simple... this is one that everyone can look at.

Last year for my Nursery kids, I made really cute gift bags filled with play-dough, a cookie cutter and some candies. You can check it out here. (just keep scrolling past the movie night, it's at the bottom of the post)

So this year I really had to come up with something creative, and this is what I did.

I bought some wooden blocks that measure about 4" x 2.5", they have a bit of a routered edge. And I painted them a variety of colors.

It would be best before hand to find out what their favorite colors are. I knew a couple of kids color preference, but I wish I could have done them all in their favorite color.

Anyways, the next step is to cut some black vinyl. I used my Cricut machine and 2 different fonts. The first more chunkier font I cut out "LOOK WHAT MADE". Then with a more scripted font I cut out each child's name.

Once the blocks were dry, I sanded the edges a bit for a more weathered look. Then I stuck the vinyl to each block.

Then for the next step. On the back of the blocks they were a bit messy, some extra paint that had oozed onto the back, and some sticky adhesive still left from the price stickers.

 So I painted the back of each block black. (Phew that''s a mouthful, back, block, black)

The next step is to add some magnet. I wanted my magnet to cover the entire length of the block, for maximum coverage.

Measure the magnet and stick it down.

 
 
 And you're done.

Wondering what you just made?

Fridge magnets of course, for your child's sweet art work.

The best part about this project was the cost. Each block cost me less than a $1.00!! Can you believe it! The blocks were 50¢ each. The paint and vinyl was supplied by my lovely friend Myril. (Thanks for all your help!!) and the magnet was $2.00 for the whole roll, and I used about half.

Of course I know a Nursery aged child will not appreciate a block of wood for Christmas(haha) so I have some candy to add to some cute bags for them.

I ♥ handmade gifts.

Many more to come... I just gotta finish them all, and that's the scary part.