cinnamon ornaments

We've needed lots to keep us busy the past few weeks because it's been cold and snowy.  While M would like nothing more than to be out in the snow all day everyday, we can't do that with baby G hanging out with us now.  So due to G's laid-back nature we've gotten to try out lots of Christmas projects from gingerbread houses to homemade gifts to these fun ideas...

I think these cinnamon ornaments are one of my favorite holiday activities because they're easy to make and always come out cute. They look baked but they're not. In fact, I made them in school one year because it's that easy. 

1/2 cup cinnamon

1/2 cup applesauce

Mix them to make a dough. Roll it out to about 1/4 inch thickness. I rolled it between a piece of parchment paper and a piece of Saran Wrap. Then use cookie cutters to cut shapes. 

Use a straw to poke holes for hanging then let the shapes dry for at least 24 hours. I kept them uncovered on parchment paper and flipped them halfway through. 

Once they're dry they can be decorated and strung to hang. We broke out the glitter glue and puffy paint for this...

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While we have lots of time for crafts, I have limited blog-writing time, so I'm including a few other Christmas decorations we've made at the tail end of this blog. 

First, the self-explanatory Christmas tree feet:

And a hand tree. Trace their hands, fold the paper and cut 6 or so out at a time. M loved decorating this with stickers. If I had been more on the ball I would have gotten cute ornament stickers.

Merry Christmas from me, M and G!

bird snacks

We have bird feeders in various places in our yard.  We get a lot of birds because we have woods behind our house.  M always checks out the birds in the morning at the bird feeder outside our living room window.  We have some kind of Japanese(?) tree right outside and the birds seem to love it there. M loves filling the bird feeders with his Papa.  He also enjoys yelling at the squirrels.  

I This morning we were talking about the snow storm that's coming this weekend and how the birds would have trouble finding food under the snow.  I found this activity during a middle-of-the-night playtime feeding with G and I loved it.  A lot of times when I find an idea on a blog I'll then Google it because chances are it's on twenty other blogs and might have different variations.  Most of the first versions of this that I found called for using unflavored gelatin.  Call me weird but giving birds jello seemed odd.  We used honey and bird food.  Seems more natural to me.

We started with a bowl full of birdseed that M enjoyed playing with for a few minutes before we started (sensory).  I didn't measure anything so I can't really tell you how much we used.  I'd guess we had about two cups of birdseed.  I eyeballed adding in the honey.  I was really trying to get a sticky consistency like play-doh but I think we ended up with a bit too much honey.  Then we spread it out and used a cookie cutter....

Our mixture was a little too soggy so what ended up working best for us was filling the cookie cutter instead of actually cutting a shape.  One we did that it held its shape fine.  We put them on wax paper and use a wooden skewer to make holes for string (which are difficult to see here).  

They're currently freezing in the freezer.  Either this afternoon or tomorrow morning we will string them and hang them from our Japanese tree.  Photos to come...

christmas ornaments 2014

When our kids are grown up it's my hope that we'll have some kind of child-made ornament on our tree from each year they were little.  Until they're in school and they (hopefully) have teachers who will help me with this, I'm on my own.  Miles has this ornament from his first year.  It doubled as the favor from his Baptism.  We made this one (one of my favorites) last year.  I found lots of fun ideas on Pinterest this year but we ended up doing our own thing...

I used Model Magic this year, basically because I have a newborn and I'm not about to mix salt dough. I have to include the disclaimer that I have never used Model Magic for anything that I wanted to last for a long period of time.  I have no idea how this ornament will hold up long term but I did coat it so hopefully it works out.  This ornament is Model Magic rolled into a ball, flattened, and cut into an oval. M then pushed his hand into it to make a hand indentation.  Then I did the same with G's hand over M's.  As I've mentioned here and here and probably various other places, baby handprints are the bane of my crafting existence.  Her hands were not painted.  They made the indentations then I painted over them on the ornament.  No handprints involved in the making of this ornament:

As you can see we also attempted a footprint, that I haven't decided what to do with yet, and M made a red moon in the process.  I also ended up writing "2013" at the bottom of M's hand in gold.  

I also did a ball ornament for G similar to M's from his first year that is linked above.  Quick and easy footprint on a ball with her name and the year written on the other side.  Tip- roll the baby's foot not the ball.  I love that we have two of these now:

Pinterest and Facebook have made late night feedings more fun and I did end up pinning a number of other ornament ideas you might want to check out.  You can find most of them on this board.