Homemade Christmas Cards

I usually don’t make cards for people, but a couple days ago, I came up with some ideas and I think they came out pretty good. I made them last night to give to people today. The only problem I’m having with them is they aren’t folding like they did before they were dry, but I think they still can make a nice decoration.

Since an eight by eleven sized sheet of paper wouldn’t be big enough, I taped two pieces of oak tag paper on top of each other to make them thicker. Then I took two more pieces and taped them together the same way. Finally, I taped the two pieces together side by side which made the surface bigger.

The first card has a snowflake, Christmas tree and wreath made of garland. There is puff paint snow all over the card as well. I mixed a half cup of glue, a half cup of shaving cream and a t-spoon of glitter to make the puff paint. It came out well and is still puffy textured, but it’s hard instead of regular puff paints that stay kind of soft.

For the snowflake, I took a cupcake liner and folded it into eights and then cut along the creases. I glued it onto the paper and then glued three cotton balls in the middle to make it more 3d. I added puff paint and glitter on top.



For the Christmas tree, I took part of a toilet paper tube, glued it to the paper and then glued garland over it to cover all the cardboard. Next, I glued cotton balls. The first row has four, then three, then two and then one for the top. For the topper, I added a glittery foam star sticker. For ornaments, I took mini pompoms and glued them to the cotton balls. After the tree was done, I added puff paint and glitter.



For the wreath, it was simple. I took a strip of garland and made a circle which I glued to the paper. For the top of the wreath, I glued some gold ribbon above the garland. I put a little puff paint and glitter over that as well to make it look like it had snowed.






My second card has a present and a Christmas tree on it. For the present, I took a tiny gift box and cut off one of the sides so I still had a square piece of cardboard. I glued the cardboard to the card and then put puff paint over it. Since my gold ribbon wasn’t sticking to the gift box, I added garland. I tried to make two little loops so it looked like a bow was on top of the box, but it got a little scrunched up while I was gluing it. It still looks shiny and kind of pretty.


For this Christmas tree, I did everything almost the same except the tube was a little bigger so I used more garland. I started my tree with five cotton balls on the bottom and worked my way to one at the top. When it came time for the topper, I realized there wasn’t enough room for a foam star so I took a different shiny star and glued it to the top cotton ball. Next, I added a few mini pompoms and shiny circles for ornaments. Finally, I put puff paint and glitter on the tree. I also put puff paint and glitter over the rest of the card to make it look frosted.





I gave one to my boyfriend already and he loved it. We’ll see if my mom will like hers tonight when I visit her and the rest of my family for our Christmas Eve celebration. I think I’ll do this again next year. I had a lot of fun making them.

A Merry Christmas Wish and A New Video

Greetings.  I come before you with a humbled heart and an open mouth, hungry for just one drop of ambrosia or something comparable (Mudder's Milk, perhaps.)

Today begins my three day festival of Christmastime.  The 23rd of every year is my extended family's reunion/get-together/smorgasbord, and in just a few short hours I will sit and sup and feast like a king.  As one who loves to eat, especially good, home-cooked stuff, this is an event I look forward to every year.

Follow that up with two days of presents and more food and you've got a satisfied-but-oft-miserable Logan.  (I  too much, leave me alone.)  Good times all around.  Hopefully we'll get to play some Rook, too.

I find myself thinking about presents and gifts and stuff and really wish we didn't live in a society where this was the understood and accepted thing to do.  I mean, I love giving and getting gifts, but how many of those gifts are given/received for the right reasons?  How many are done out of mandate?  Where's the love from that?  Why are we obligated to buy so many gifts?  Is Christmastime just a season of money exchanging and fulfilling traditions?  Sadly, I think so.

Anyway, that's not the point of this.  I don't expect that to ever change, partially because I know my family would never go for it, and partially because our society is too far gone in that direction.  So I continue to follow the traditions and dream of ways to rock the catbox a little for next year.

I hope you all have a truly, madly, deeply wonderful Christmas.  I know I will.

In the spirit of Christmas, I've had a song stuck in my head for a few days, which I've taken the liberty to record and post up on that youtube thingy.  It's embedded below, if you'd like to give 'er a listen.  I think it sounds pretty good, and hopefully you do too.


So, I hope this post wasn't too depressing.  A cynical view on Christmas and a song about double suicide.  Wow.  That's in no way where I intended to go.  I think perhaps I should just stop now.  Look for a full week next week.  A book review or two.  A summary of 2010's reading, with all the bells and whistles.  Promises promises.

Have a great Christmas, everybody.  Seriously.  Enjoy the thing that makes you love and feel loved and remember to think about Jesus every once in a while. 

8 instant Christmas centerpieces

Everyone wants a festive centerpiece for Christmas -- here are 12 ideas for centerpieces you can "create" in an instant.

1. A beautifully wrapped poinsettia says 'tis the season!
   
   
2. Grab a large clear-glass bowl from your cupboard. Add a variety of brightly-colored Christmas ornaments for a sparkly centerpiece.
   
   
3. Maybe you won't have chestnuts roasting on an open fire, but you can certainly display them on your table. Line the bottom of a bowl with chestnuts and add fresh cranberries on top for color.
   
   
4. Everything looks good in a group of three. Find a trio of favorite Christmas figurines (angels, snowmen, Santas, etc.) and place them in a group in the center of your table.
   
   
5. Were you baking up a storm this season? Decorate the table with a gingerbread house or a tower of Christmas cookies.
   
   
6. Candles make an easy centerpiece for any occasion. Grab a few pillars or tapers in holiday colors and arrange them on a festive tray.
   
   
7. Fill a hurricane vase with pine cones, holly berries, and other natural signs of the season.
   
   
8. Cover a tray or fill a bowl or hurricane vase with seasonal candies and foods. The color and shine of peppermints mixed with oranges and walnuts makes a good-enough-to-eat centerpiece that is worthy of any Christmas table.
   

Christmas Collage

Christmas Collage

As I was wrapping some gifts over the past week, I thought about all the scraps of wrapping paper, ribbon, old bows etc that are just thrown out. The kids can use these things for different art projects. One is a collage. You can even use extra materials from decorating the tree or from homemade gifts you might be working on. I don’t have any examples of these, but I thought the idea might be useful for someone’s lesson plan or project at home.

Materials that you can use:
Glue,
Paper,
Wrapping paper scraps,
Old bows,
Scraps of ribbon,
Felt or other fabric pieces,
Garland,
Pompoms,
Candy cane or other Christmas candy wrappers,
Pine needles,
Pine cones,
Glitter,
And anything else you might have that would fit in with a Christmas collage.
Another idea is to sprinkle on a little bit of cinnamon, coco or another powdered spice that might remind you of winter and Christmas.
If the kids are old enough, they can cut out a snowflake, gingerbread man, gingerbread house, snowman, stocking, Santa, Christmas tree, candy cane, or any other winter pattern and glue the materials to it.
Give them the materials and see what they create!

Christmas Present Sorting

I had thought of this at the beginning of the holiday season, but hadn’t wrapped any gifts yet. Here are some wrapped gifts, unwrapped gifts and some different sized boxes for Christmas present sorting.
You can sort them into many different groups depending on the shape, size, height, weight, color, texture, etc of your gifts.
Sorting from:















The larger the variety of gifts or empty boxes, the more sorting you can do!

The 5 best Christmas albums to play this season

Need an easy playlist for your Christmas celebrations? Pick up a few of these classic and contemporary Christmas albums and you've got an easy mix of tunes perfect for parties.

1. Bing Crosby's White Christmas
   Start things off with a true classic when you purchase Bing Crosby's White Christmas album (for only $3.99 on Amazon, you can't go wrong). The disc is full of classics like "I'll Be Home for Christmas", "Silent Night", and the title track "White Christmas", you'll have just over a dozen songs to get you in the holiday spirit.
   
   
2. Barenaked Ladies' Barenaked for the Holidays
   Aside from the snooze-worthy version of "Jingle Bells" that kicks off this disc, the Barenaked Ladies' holiday album is a must-have. A mix of both quirky and sentimental Christmas, Hanukkah, and winter songs make up this wonderful collection. The disc also features guest appearances by Sarah McLachlan and Michael Buble. ("God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen/We Three Kings" featuring Sarah McLachlan is especially beautiful.)
   
   
3. Trans-Siberian Orchestra's Christmas Eve and Other Stories
   What did we do before the Trans-Siberian Orchestra came around? Christmas Eve and Other Stories showcases 17 Trans-Siberian Orchestra songs and includes fan-favorite "Christmas Eve/Sarajevo 12/24", (often mistakenly called "Carol of the Bells") which is an instrumental medley of "Carol of the Bells" and "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen".
   
   
4. A Charlie Brown Christmas: The Original Sound Track Recording Of The CBS Television Special
   If you can get your hands on a copy of the original soundtrack from A Charlie Brown Christmas, you are very lucky indeed! The original has the music just as we remember it (without the bells and whistles added to more recent releases). Playing this disc at a Christmas party is sure to invoke nostalgic memories of the season.
   
   
5. The original A Very Special Christmas CD
   Though there are now half a dozen A Very Special Christmas compilations circulating, the original is the best, featuring Christmas songs sung by '80s superstars. From Run D.M.C.'s wonderfully cheesy Christmas in Hollis to U2's rocking Christmas (Baby Please Come Home) and Alison Moyet's hauntingly beautiful The Coventry Carol, the album features contemporary hits and proceeds from the sale of the album benefit Special Olympics.

Tune in to one of these albums for a very special Christmas of your own!

Christmas Sensory Tub

Here’s my version of a Christmas sensory tub.

What’s in it:

Wrapping paper,
Tissue paper,
Gold ribbon,
Bows,
Mini gift boxes,
Mini gift bags,
Tape,
Mini stocking,
Measuring cups and spoons,
Stones,
Peppermints,
Large pompoms,
Toy stocking,
Ornament,
Plastic hooks,
Blueberry scented candle,
And garland.

The mini plush stocking I found at Walmart. I wanted to add a chocolate or pine scented candle, but didn’t have one so I chose the blueberry. It smells great and I found it at Lands End Gift Shop. The stocking toy came from a Christmas stocking I bought for my cats and I never gave them the toy. I added the stones, pompoms and peppermints for measuring and putting them in the gift boxes and bags. There are peppermints in the ornament as well. It’s plastic and originally came with some other Christmas candy. I added the plastic hooks for adding to the top of the ornament like you would when you are decorating the tree.
The wrapping paper, tissue paper, ribbon, bows, tape and boxes are obviously for wrapping. I added garland just because it’s festive. The peppermints and candle made the box smell good.
I would’ve liked to include candy canes, bells, mini Christmas trees and different types of wrapping paper, but I didn’t have them on hand. I hope you enjoy this sensory tub.

Christmas Match

Here are some pictures for a Christmas match game. You can cut out the pictures and make cards for a game of memory or if the kids are younger, you can just match them up and learn the words.
Some of the obvious things are missing like snowmen or snowflakes, but I'm planning another winter match game and they'll be in that post. There will be ten pairs in that post as well so you can combine the two to make a longer game or have more variety.

My Decorations

Here are our decorations for this year.
Here's our tree. It didn't come out as well as I'd like because there aren't enough lights and if we added more, it'd be too much. Same goes for the garland. the angel topper is pretty, but it's a little wobbly because it's too big for this type of tree. I couldn’t get a good picture of the whole thing without taking a picture of everything else in my living room so here’s the top two thirds of it. The bottom layer of branches aren’t decorated anyway because I’m afraid the cats will mess with the branches and knock off the ornaments. I’d rather keep them safe.

We have some great ornaments this year.
We have a couple of new birds, a snow covered acorn and three cupcakes.

I found them at Sears unexpectedly. Some of our classics are the M&M light covers, a ghost in an ice cream cone, an elf stringing popcorn, a glitter covered cell phone, a snow baby holding a star, a dog in a gift box and a sparkling clam that we found at a local gift shop called, Lands End. We have a few traditional balls, but we try to have mostly unique ornaments. At some point, I’ll take pictures of some of the ornaments individually.

Here’s another tradition, the stockings!

Each of us has one and we put a few small things in them every year. Mine isn’t here on this wall, but here it is.

I’ve had this stocking since I came home from the hospital in it as a baby. Back then, if your birthday was close to Christmas, they gave you a stocking.

I usually have a Christmas display as well. This year I have the big snowman who I found years ago at the Christmas Tree Shop, a small snow covered house that we’ve had in our family ever since I can remember, another smaller house, a pond, snowbank, a boat that lights up and a light up Walmart. In the windows you can see things that would be in the store and that’s why I bought it.


I also have a small fiber optic Christmas tree that I found at Biglots and an ice skating rink. When you turn it on, the skaters move, it plays music and lights up.


I found this polar bear cookie jar on Ebay last year and the baker I found at Walmart a few years ago.
Some of my favorite decorations are our snowmen from Hallmark’s collection of holiday snowmen.

He sings Let It Snow, Jingle Bell Rock and Have a Holly Jolly Christmas.

Here's a trio that sings next to their Christmas tree. They sing a version of Rocking Around the Christmas Tree.

The snowman, penguin and dog sing while on their sleigh. they sing Sleigh Ride.

This snowman isn't from hallmark. I found him at Biglots. The marshmallows in his hot chocolate sing Let It Snow along with him.

This snowman DJ plays a mix of Ice Ice Baby and Jingle Bells. He moves to the music as if he's mixing on the turn tables and if you plug in your own mp3 player, he'll move along to your music as well.

A snowman holding a book. Someone we know won this and she didn't want it so she gave it to us.


The last snowman of our collection for now. He lights up.
There are all the decorations we have out this year.