Snowman Wreath

Isn't he the cutest? I love my new snowman wreath. It was incredibly easy and economical to make, too. I already had the center wreath in the basement.

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Advent Activities Rundown

I cannot believe it is only three days until I begin our annual advent activity tradition. I posted last year about the things we included in 2009, the first year we switched from candy to fun, you can find that post here. Last year I had planned to post our activities six days at a time as they happened but the month was just far too busy for blogging and I only posted the first six. Instead of blogging them in January I saved it for a more timely post...now! I've had several requests for our list of activities. I'm still working on this year's list. Many of these will remain the same since in just two years they've become things the kids really look forward to.

But without further ado here's what happened in 2010:

December 1st
Decorate Your Own Christmas Tree in Your Bedroom

December 2nd
Ice Cream Sundae Bar After Dinner

The slip of paper had to specify after dinner or the kids would've been asking for these as soon as breakfast was over.

December 3rd
Write and Mail Letters to Santa

After they created their letters to Santa we drove to the mall to drop them in the large red mailbox Macy's has set up specifically to collect letters for Santa. The kids enjoy the large Santa mailbox and I like the fact Macy's donates a dollar for every letter to the Make a Wish Foundation.

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A Jasmine Yarn Wig

Princess Fierce wanted to be Jasmine for Halloween. She made up her mind in September and never wavered. I'm fairly confident the decision was based purely on the fact she wears a two piece outfit. I lucked out and found two complete blue and pink Jasmine costume including gold shoes at a local consignment store for under $30 for everything.

She wore the pink outfit to see Disney on Ice: Dare to Dream with her cousin. An excellent show if you can still catch it in your town. For the show I tried to style her short, thin hair in the best imitation of Jasmine's hair I could manage. She loved the result. But for Halloween I'd made the offhand comment that I thought I could make her a Jasmine yarn wig. After Disney on Ice she told me she hoped I could make one but if I couldn't she'd be happy with her hair this way again. Such a sweet girl.

I searched Pinterest and Google for inspiration but came up with only one other person making a yarn Jasmine wig. And she used a completely different method than I was comfortable with. I cannot crochet yarn into a highlighting cap. Nope. So I went my own way. I started with a pair of black girls tights from the clearance rack at Target. $1.50 for her wig cap. I put the waist around her hairline then tied a tight knot with the legs. 

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Chalkboard Pumpkin Countdown

Fourteen days until Halloween! I have a snowman that countsdown to Christmas but nothing else. And my kids love to know exactly how many days are left until a special event. This year I created a chalkboard pumpkin to countdown the days until Halloween. Each day we wipe off the number and write the new one with chalk. After Halloween I'll change it to read Days Until Thanksgiving.

Just start with a good sized pumpkin. This one had a rounded front shown here and a nice flattened back that worked perfect for the countdown.

Apply a few coats of chalk board paint. And you're done.

Huge added perk to this simple craftiness is the kids can use the chalk to create different Jack-o-Lantern faces on the other side.

Happy Halloween!

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Snake Wreath

This is another creation credited to Pinterest. I'd seen a snake wreath pop up there a month ago, a snake wreath created by none other than Martha Stewart. I had to make the wreath with my family's snake history including the copperhead that bit our dog last year and the rat snake somehow discovered in my son's room; we needed a snake wreath for Halloween.

I found a plethora of rubber snakes at the Dollar Tree and dollar spot section at Target.

I also needed a wreath. I wanted a large grapevine wreath and I found this one on half price day at my favorite thrift store.

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Jellyfish in a Bottle

I saw this idea on Pinterest from a blog in Thailand. I knew I wanted to make it with my kids.

You'll need an empty plastic bottle, preferably a smooth one. Mine is a Smartwater bottle. A clear plastic bag. In the Thai blog, she used a clear shopping bag but I don't have a single store near me that uses clear shopping bags. They're all white or yellow. However, the thinner produce bags are clear so I used one of those and hoped it would work.

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Custom Ribbons for Pennies

My neighbor and I volunteered to handle the neighborhood Independence Day parade and picnic this year. One of the items handed out at each parade is a ribbon for the parade participants. In the past these have been purchased from the dollar or party stores at around a dollar a piece. I thought I could surely beat that cost.

I made these for pennies a piece. 

And the best part is mine could be worn by the parade participants and not just looped on to the handle bars of their decorated bikes.

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The Wizarding Week of Harry Potter

My oldest son loves Harry Potter. This is him decked out in his Quidditch robe at Dragon*Con last year. He's loved Harry since he was barely two years old. His early affection can be blamed on HBO's constant running of The Sorcerer's Stone. It captivated him. We took him to see The Chamber of Secrets in the theater and it may very well have been his first movie theater experience. When Hagrid returns to the dining room cheers in the final scene my little boy stood up and cried because he knew the movie was ending.

Fast forward five years when Thing One is 8 years old he began reading the Harry Potter books. He had never seen any movies beyond those first two in all the years between. When he began the books his Harry Pottter love was reborn with an unquenching thirst. He voraciously read the books from the library. And soon wanted to own them all. 

Here he is with one of his favorite birthday presents on his ninth birthday, the remaining six books he could keep. Once he had completed reading the series we rented the Prisoner of Azkabam through the Half-Blood Prince for him to watch. He already knew disappointment from a book converted to film but was satisfied with the adaptation of Harry Potter.

The second Harry Potter Thing One ever saw in a movie theater was the first he actually remembers: The Deathly Hallows, Part One. He was over joyed and immediately a year long conversation began about seeing the final film. And during this year his Harry Potter love manifested in new ways.


His closet shrine for instance.

With a shelf dedicated to all thing Harry Potter.

His painted pumpkin for last Halloween was an homage to Harry Potter.

His Halloween costume last year even came with a request to cut his shaggy locks shorter and spray his hair dark.

And more recently our Museum of Natural History hosted a Wizards and Witches Weekend and he committed again to a costume as a Hogwarts student.

So as the date grew close for the end of Harry Potter in cinema we discussed the idea of a Harry Potter viewing party complete with Harry Potter snacks. I made a grave error in this discussion forgetting each film is approximately two and a half hours long. No one would come to a party to watch over 21 hours of videos. Oy! How would I tell my dear boy his party could not happen? Then I had another idea I pitched first to my man. A Wizarding Week of Harry Potter! We'd determine what day his father would be taking him to see the new movie then count back seven days and show one movie and serve one themed snack per day. My man was on board and I presented it to Thing One. He was sold!

Well, today is the day my man takes my biggest little man to see the end of Harry Potter. I imagine this may be a tad bitttersweet for him but I'm glad to have wrapped the event around some fabulous memories. Here's how his Wizarding Week went....

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Springtime Bird Nest Cupcakes

My friend next door planned an egg hunt Saturday for the neighborhood kids. I offered to bring cupcakes for everyone. My initial plan was to create cupakes with bunny bums on them. I had flattened over 50 mini marshmallows with the idea to color them into bunny feet.

But I wasn't impressed with the way the cupcake turned out. Perhaps it was my husband's words I kept hearing when he saw this...

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Peep Wreath

My friend next door made a cute and simple Peep chick wreath the other weekend. I had to follow suit and make one too. I chose the Peep bunnies just to be less of a copy cat. This wreath cost less than $7 to make. Shazzam!

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Silk Dyed Easter Eggs

This year I tried out silk dyed eggs. I saw this technique last year after I had already dyed marbelized eggs. Drats! But then again maybe waiting a year was worth it. I'll definitely be doing this process again.

Here's a list of all you'll need to do the same project:

• large uncooked eggs
• 100% silk ties, scarves, shirts, etc.
• 100% cotton cloth squares
• rubber bands, twist ties or string
• non-reactive pot to boil eggs (enamel, glass or stainless steel)
• vinegar
• patience

My kids and I set off to the thrift stores in late March in search of silk ties. I let the kids pick whatever tickled their fancy as long as it had a 100% silk label and was $1 or less.

Here's our bounty of ties.

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April Fools' Breakfast

This year for April Fools' Day I decided to do a candy breakfast. It was inspired off this idea from Family Fun magazine. Following their directions I created the miniature candy breakfast you see here. But I thought I could make a few modifications to the bacon.

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Marbelized Easter Eggs

Last year was the first year I attempted dying eggs with my kidlets. I remember dying eggs when I was a kid but for some unspecific reason I'd not done it with my own. I think it was a combination of the mess potential and the what do you do with them now issue. But last year I cleared the table, boiled a dozen eggs and prepared to relax my uptight ways and let creativity happen. 

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I'm On a Boat with my Nautical Themed Pashmina

In order to understand this post you have to know a couple of things.

First you must know about one of my man's absolute favorite SNL Digital Shorts: "I'm On a Boat."

Explicit language warning: to see the cleaner, dubbed version click here.

When we went to Legoland last year my man flipped that Lego thought to include this shout out in their Miniland USA portion of the park. Almost made stepping on Legos at 2am forgivable. Almost, that really hurts!

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Ice Wreaths

I did not create this crafty bit of winter fun. I can't even remember where I first saw it months ago. A quick google search returns far too many variations to know where to credit. What I do know is when I saw it I thought it would never be cold enough, long enough in the south to make an ice wreath. And then my town became Hothlanta.

I used one of my old bundt pans for my biggest child to create. The younger two just got glass bowls with a juice glass in the middle to create the hole.

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Handprint Wreath

This simple handprint wreath was part of our Advent activities this past Christmas. We're lucky enough to have my parents living just two doors down. And recently my dad's mom has come to live with them, now my kids have their grandparents and their great grandmother living close by. Great Grandma Gene's preferred holiday decor is white and blue; my mom's Christmas style is all Santas all the time. To help her feel more at home my mom found a small white tree and outfitted it with blue and white lights for Great Grandma Gene's bedroom and I thought the kids could make her something to help make the room festive as well.

To make this wreath I traced and cutout three of each of my three kiddos' hands on white and cream paper; total of 18 handprints. I used a dinner plate to trace a circle on a scrap piece of cardboard and a smaller bowl to trace and cut out the middle circle for my wreath form.

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Crystal Snowflakes

We don't get much snow in the southeast but thanks to this simple craft the kids have been making their own large sparkly snowflakes the past two years. All you need is boiling water, pipe cleaners, borax and a large container...easy peasy.

The snowflakes really last too. This is the one my daughter made in 2009. The color faded from hanging in her window an entire year but the crystal structure remains strong.

It now hangs in my laundry room since her current one took its old place in her window. Fitting spot since it's made from household laundry detergent.

To make your own you're going to need some pipe cleaners. I cut 3 pieces about 5" long and another 6 pieces just under 2" long per snowflake.

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Recycle Old Christmas Cards into New Christmas Cards

A great Christmas craft for the kids and a wonderful way to recycle all the cards you receive from previous years. This was a favorite Advent activity last year and again this year.

The night before this activity I cut out all the images and messages from my stack of old cards. I also fold construction paper in different colors into cards.

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How to Remove Nail Polish from Clothing

Princess Fierce wanted to paint my toes the other day with her dark blue glitter nail polish. Her first attempt at giving a pedicure resulted in my having blue nails and toes...and nail polish on her pretty new-to-her dress. Oy.

The polish couldn't have been red? Nope blue polish that dried practically black.

Close up on the polish.

I didn't even attempt nail polish remover fearing it would take the color from the dress. I was planning to cover up the spots with some type of new embellishments on the dress. But before I did that I thought I'd just google my problem to see if there were an answer. And I found an improbable one.

But one that lots of people swore worked.

So I gave it a try.

And check it out. No spots!

Look closer. Can you see the polish?

Look as close as you can. I can't even tell where it was. Amazing.

And what exactly created this miracle?

Bug Spray!

Yep, this bug spray right here did the trick. I didn't believe it until it worked. I first tried with pump bug spray and nothing happened. I didn't give up after so many interweb comments said it would work. I bought aerosol bug spray and tried again. A spray. A rub with a white wash cloth. BOOM! Immediate lightening of the TWO WEEK dried nail polish. All in all it took me about five minutes of spraying and rubbing. A toss in the wash to remove the buggy smell and all was new again. Unbelievable. I absolutely had to share. Next time you have nail polish land on your favorite fabrics give it a try.

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