A Glittery Menagerie

I wanted this year’s ornament to be something a little bit different, a bit original, something glittery…

I picked up a package of clothespins from the Dollar Tree, a couple of tubes of plastic animals, and grabbed the package of glitter from my stash and set to work.

First glue the animals to the clothespin with a hot glue gun…

Choose just the right color glitter for your animals. I just had to make a golden goose…

Paint each animal completely with white glue. It’s hard to get everything, so do it carefully…

Sprinkle everything with glitter, covering every surface…

Let them dry…

I’m keeping the chicken for myself. :o)

Mini Advent Wreath in a Pot

Sunday was the first day of Advent, the season before Christmas when we get ready for Jesus’ coming again and remember His first coming.

Every night we light a candle and read a portion of scripture. Each candle has it’s own meeting and symbolism: Hope, Peace, Joy, Love and the Christ candle.

At our Family Nite service at church, we made mini advent wreaths in mini flower pots.

Buy purple (or blue), pink and white birthday candles; mini terra cotta flower pots; air dry clay; and fake greens.

First paint and/or decorate your pot however you would like. We used foam stickers and ribbon.

Then fill the pot with the air dry clay. Top with greenery.

Insert the candles into the clay. If you want to re-insert new candles in later, pull the candles out right away. After the clay dries you can take the candles in and out as you like or need.

  Be sure to use your time as a family to spend time in prayer, the Word and talking about what your family is thankful for this holiday season!

You can look on-line for a Bible reading schedule… I especially like this one HERE.

Pumpkin Snowmen

What do you do with all those leftover pumpkins from your fall decorating? You know, the ones that still look pretty good but just don’t have that Christmas-y look. Don’t worry, you don’t need to toss them! Just add some with paint, a few accessories and you have an adorable winter decoration for your front porch!

I did one coat of primer and then a couple of coats of craft paint…

Then glue the pumpkins together: largest on bottom and smallest on top…

Then paint your faces using craft paint…

Add accessories: scarf, hat, buttons…

Then your snowmen are ready to live outside…

This might be the most snow we see before Christmas, so we’re gonna enjoy it! 

Snowflakes

Two Sundays ago, one of the girls at our Family Nite service at church showed us all how to make these beautiful snowflakes! Since we can’t always depend on the real thing here in the PNW, I made some to hang in our living room windows…

Apparently the outside was jealous of how wintery it looked inside… ;o)

Here are the step-by-step instructions on how to make these yourself… Sorry, some of the pictures didn’t turn out as well as I would like. But hopefully, you’ll get the picture!

1. Fold your piece of paper (don’t use heavy cardstock paper) so that you have a square. We used some old legal-sized paper. If you use an 8.5x11 piece, you’ll have less waste. Cut off the rectangle piece left over.

  2. Leave your square folded in half.

3. Beginning at the fold, cut two strips on either side. Stop just before you get to the center of the triangle. Don’t let your two cuts meet. Leave about an 1/2” space in between the two cuts.

  4. Repeat one or two more times, making sure your cuts don’t meet in the center. Leave that space! The more cuts you have the lacier your snowflake becomes

5. Open up the square. Bring the two loose ends together and tape into a roll. Be sure to use invisible scotch tape. You can make the roll as tight or as loose as you want. Just do each of the pieces the same way.

  .6. Turn the snowflake over.

7. Bring the next two points together and tape. You can have a bit of overlap if you like.

  8. Flip it over again. Bring the last two points together and tape. Again, you can have some overlap. If you’ve done more cuts, keep flipping and taping until you are done.

9. Repeat steps 1-8 six more times!

*This is where the pics start to get a bit hard to see… Sorry about the white on white!

 

10. Tape 3 of the sections together in the middle where your points joined. Make sure they are all going the same direction. Unlike in this pic… Oops! ;o)

11. Staple the top points together.

12. Repeat steps 10 & 11 for the second half.

13. Staple the centers together. Then tape the two halves together where the points meet in the middle.

I left mine just plain, but the girls at church added some sparkle to their snowflakes!

I tried making one out of a 12x12 piece of scrapbook paper. I really like the two-tone look but think it would have been better with one more cut for a more even look.

It was also way too big to make a snowflake out of! But I think they would look lovely hanging just like that! Decorations for next Christmas???

Santa Skirt

I actually planned to make this skirt way back in August. Plenty of time to have it ready for our big Christmas Kick-Off open house! In reality I got it done at 11:25pm the night before the shindig…

But I got it done all by myself, thanks to some great FB chat instructions from my sister, and it looks great as long as you don’t look too closely! ;o)

Don’t look too close, remember? LOL

Luckily the print is just so darn cute that no one would notice all the flaws anyhow…

Aren’t those Santa’s adorable???

Although the skirt was done, there was still one hitch. Nothing to wear with it! I had searched all summer and fall for the perfect red sweater to no avail. I had become so desperate I had even decided I would settle on a red turtleneck if it was the right shade of red… Nothing! In a last ditch attempt, I made a stop at the Goodwill the day before the party. They there were, TWO sweaters in just the right shade of red and in my size! And all for under $10!!!

I already have my Santa skirt schedule all figured out: next appearance, Family Christmas on Saturday!

In the meantime, maybe I should just leave it hanging by the wet bar in the family room??? It matches the rest of the décor perfectly! ;o)

Christmas Crafts

I started out with such lofty ambition but then reality got a hold of me. I did not get to do all the cool crafts I wanted to, but I did the ones that were most important to me and they turned out great!

Last January, my mom and I picked up this quilt panel at the shop in Cannon Beach.

I didn’t get it done until guests had already arrived at our annual Christmas open house (and only because my mom helped me take out all the tags and pins) but it turned out PERFECT! Not only do I love the vintage look and the colors, and it fits perfectly in the space I had for it on the kitchen wall, but it is probably the very first quilt I have ever done that has perfectly straight lines and no puckers or ripples in it at all!!!

I love every one of the squares!

  

I even had the exact match of embroidery floss for the ties!

I have always wanted Christmas curtains for the kitchen and this year I finally made one… The retro print is just right for the kitchen decor and I love the little additions I made to it; like a lining and the red and green borders!

I had a bit of the fabric left over so I used the rest to make myself a Christmas apron… I even added a lining to the apron and pleats! I never do pleats, but I think it added a very nice touch!!!

I like the way it looks hanging in the kitchen… It matches my carousel canisters and measuring cups perfectly!

I also decided I needed a retro kitchen towel to hang on my stove. So I traced a cute Merry Christmas in a retro font and embroidered it on an old kitchen towel I found at a second hand store.

Like every year, I made Christmas ornaments for our families. This year I used eggs… I just love our homegrown brown eggs and they made really sweet little ornaments. Just don’t drop one! You can check out how I made them at The Backyard Farmwife…