Oh Christmas Tree {Felt Preschool Activity}

 "Less is More" definitely does not apply to our Christmas tree decorating in this home! Each and every ornament we own ended up on the tree. It didn't matter if it was half broken, missing a hook, or if it wasn't even an ornament. I found bells with string, foamie crafts and other little crafts just sitting on the branches. The kids had SUCH a great time and I didn't want to hinder that, but I did have to put my foot down with some of the "ornaments". Our tree isn't glamorous or elegant, but it's colorful and bright, and decorated with lots of love by 3 little children so we love it!

 I decided to keep the fun going by creating some felt trees for the kids to decorate....over and over. It seemed like a good idea since Kaylee has been taking ornaments off of the tree, just to put them back on.

 I cut out trees from felt and made some little lights as well. All of the other decorations are from a felt advent calendar that I made 6 years ago and don't use anymore. They were perfect for this project!

 Aaron asked that I make a pocket to keep his ornaments in. So I just hot glued a piece of felt to the back of the tree.

 It worked like a charm!

 They had fun going through their ornaments and decorating and re-decorating their trees.

When they were done and I was done snapping photos, I pulled the fabric off of the table and...

It made the perfect tree skirt. Just 2 yards of fabric wrapped around the tree. Just right. This matches much better with our new stockings than the old one I had been using. It isn't even December, the the Christmas spirit is alive and well in this house!

What We've Been Up To

Thank you to all of the guest bloggers who shared their fun advent tutorials with us last week! I hope you enjoyed them and were able to pin some ideas for the future. To see all of the ideas, click on the advent button on my side bar.

We had a great holiday weekend. One of the best! We didn't travel, get up early or have to go anywhere unless we wanted to. Derrick had 4 days off and we spent them doing things as a family, including playing games, setting up the Christmas tree, and taking family photos.

I'm pretty happy with how our pictures turned out! It was a quick session since I forgot to charge the camera batteries...oops! We were able to get 25 or so pictures before it went dead so we kept each pose quick and moved to the next one. The kids did really well and maybe it was because the whole thing was done in 20 minutes or so :)

I've also been working on making homemade stockings for all of us. Now that Ruby is here, I decided that matching stockings were a must! Here is a sneak peak.

I am working on a tutorial to post sometime this week. I'm waiting on some sunny weather so that I finish taking the photos of the finished product with some natural light. They were simple to make and I saved a bundle by making them myself. I priced them out this year online (because I wasn't really sure I wanted to take on this task, lol) and they ranged from $17.99-$49.99 for nice personalized stockings. I created 6 stockings for around $8.00.

I hope you'll come back this week and see how I did it!

Now to catch up on the house ....that's what we do every Monday!

Have a great week!

Homemade Advent Calendars {Day 8} The Whitaker's Window

Hello blog-land! This is my very first ever crafty guest post. *deep breath*. OK GO!

I am Leah from The Whitaker's Window, a small family- and craft-related blog. Thanks to Brandy for letting me share the advent calendar I made last year for my daughter. Since I generally can't remember what happened yesterday, much less last year, let's see if I can recall how I made this:

I first set out to find my jars. I believe I used these ones from Specialty Bottle. They don't hold a whole lot, they stick out far from the fridge, and if I could do it all again, I might buy wider, deeper boxes, unless I was doing paper-only inserts. But, having said that, everything I bought for the boxes this year fit inside these teeny things. Use your best judgement - Specialty Bottle has a lot of different sizes and options for you to choose from.
 

I decided my "theme" would be something I love a lot: "How the Grinch Stole Christmas". I LOVE MAX THE DOG! He is the reason I ever wanted a dog in the first place. :) I went to Michael's and found some Grinch stickers with a lot of Max the dog on them, and I also picked up some black number stickers, heavy-duty sticky-back magnets, and Modge-Podge while I was there.  .
 

I decorated each tin lid individually with paper and the stickers, numbering them from 1-24. Then I Modge-Podged the lids, and attached a sticky magnet to the back of each tin. It's easy to arrange them however I wish on the fridge. Plus, it saves me some valuable decorating space on my mantel and shelves. :)
 

This year I looked on the Internet for fun ideas of things to put inside the tins. In case you are wondering, here is what is inside each one this year:

1.) Jingle Bell Necklace

2.) 50 cents

3.) Coupon to Paint

Side note about this one: In our house this means "paint with REAL paint"! Not watercolors or finger paint, but the messiest paint you can give a two-year-old. :)

4.) Penguin Socks (rolled up tight!)

5.) Winter temporary tattoos

6.) Coupon to go see Santa

7.) Dora stickers

8.) Gummy Bears

9.) Hello Kitty Bracelet

10.) Deflated balloon

11.) Coupon to watch a Christmas movie

12.) Owl Necklace

13.) Coupon to open 1 present

14.) Gummy Bears

15.) Coloring sheets (2, folded up!!)

16.) Wonder Pets Stickers

17.) Coupon for a sucker

18.) Gingerbread Bracelet

19.) Dress-Up Skirt

20.) Winter temporary tattoos

21.) Coupon for Christmas Books

22.) Christmas stickers

23.) Gummy Bears

24.) Invitation to Jesus' Birthday Party

Other ideas I found online were: pom-pom animals, quarter machine toys, and little cars/dolls. I think next year I may make more of the things rather than buy them, but this year was my first try.

So, that is my advent calendar! Thanks for checking it out. I hope you come say hi over at The Whitaker's Window soon. Have a Happy Holiday Season!

~Leah

***

Thanks for stopping by Leah!

Here is another fun idea from Centsational Girl!
 

Homemade Advent Calendars {Day 7} A lil' Bit of This- A lil' Bit of That

Hi! This is Leda from A lil' Bit of This - A lil' Bit of That.

So excited Brandy invited me to share my Christmas Countdown Box over
here at Gluesticks! I'm a mother of 8 and a grandma of 4, with 2 more
coming! My daughters and I do our crafty blog together. We love to
share ideas this way and LOVE when we GET ideas from fun blogs like
Gluesticks! So come over for a visit and leave some comment love and
Merry Christmas! 

Christmas Countdown Box

from this...

and this...

to THIS!

As I was coveting this box and it's cute little boxes (can you tell I don't have a Silhouette?) and lamenting on my plight in life because I couldn't have one...it got me thinking. Hey, I could do this...kind of. I went to Walmart and searched high and low for small containers. Next I drew the box on a sheet of paper the size that I wanted my box. My computer drafting daughter demanded that I make this project easier on her dad and made me draw it to scale! You should have seen my husbands face when he saw the paper! But, the sweetie that he is, just picked it up and went to work. While he was making the box, I dug into my stash of paper, ribbons, buttons, brads and bling to cover the containers.
Some of the more 'creative' containers:
*plastic travel size Q-tips, even has a built in box! #8,19,23
*Ball 8 oz plastic freezer jars #1
*plastic knee-high nylons container #3,4
*Rubbermaid plastic food container #7,9
*plastic screw travel jars #12,18,24
*child bowl & lid. red bottom imprinted with toys! #14
*plastic soap dish #2
*plastic jewelry organizers #11,13
*glass sugar jar #16

The CRAZY part of this adventure: I printed the numbers and cut them out by hand! Yip, those small numbers kind of tried my patience. AGAIN, lamenting the lack of the aforementioned Silhouette! But I endured, knowing that my husband was working hard at his part of the CRAZY project, just to make me happy.
After painting the wooden box black-now all I need to do is fill them with little gifts and candy and we're ready for December 1st! I just love how this turned out! Oh, I can't forget the large pencil & notebook hanging off a giant push pin on the side (my demanding drafting daughters delightful idea). What would Christmas be without Letters to Santa?
So, this turned out SO GREAT...I think I'll look at the after Halloween sales for small containers and do this for a COUNT DOWN TO HALLOWEEN! :)

Thanks for stopping by Leda!
***
Here is a fun idea from Martha Stewart!


and another from The Dating Divas (Spouses Christmas Countdown!)

Homemade Advent Calendars {Day 6; Part 2} Lotte Lu and Brother Too

Hello everyone!! My name is Kaleigh and I blog over at Lotte Lu and Brother Too.  I'm a working momma trying to balance creativity and my life with Lotte Lu and Brother too.  I LOVE party planning, sewing and having fun with my little family.

I'm so excited that Brandy has opened up her blog for all of the FANTASTIC advent calendars.  I'm sort of an advent calendar junkie!  They are one of my favorite memories of Christmas at my grandma's house, and I have 2 hand-me-down calendars in my Christmas stash.

Lotte is 2 and a half and it is the first Christmas she is able to understand the magic of it all.  So I wanted to give her a calendar of her own to help countdown until the big day!

This cute little guy is in her room above her bookcase.

I didn't want it to be too expensive or too heavy to hang so I made it out of Balsa board.  It is only $3.00 from the craft store, and it can be found in the modeling section.

I used Martha Stewart glitter paint (AMAZING STUFF) on clothespins that I already had in my stash.  Everything is hot-glued together in a sort of random fashion.  The circles where cut from my Cricut and I hand drew the numbers on.

I couldn't find the "perfect ornaments" so I picked up a bag of vase filler from the craft store ($4.99 with a 40% off coupon!).  I made them into ornaments with a straight pin, some glue and ribbon.

Every day in December she will wake up and put a new ornament on her mini Christmas tree.

This advent calendar is something we will have for years to come and I can't wait for the many Christmases filled with wonder and excitement!

Thank you so much Brandy for having me!  Merry Christmas everyone, I hope you'll stop by and see me at Lotte Lu and Brother Too!

***

Thanks for stopping by Kaleigh!

Here is a fun idea from Naptime Crafters

and another from The Paper Pony

Homemade Advent Calendars {Day 6} Clean and Scentsible

Hello everyone! My name is Jenn and I blog over at Clean and Scentsible. I am absolutely thrilled to be here at Gluesticks for Brandy's Advent Calendar series.  Advent calendars can be SO much fun!!  My kids {and maybe me too!} really look forward to them each year.  I always try to do something Christmas related with the kids each day in December and last year I created this canvas advent calendar to hold little notes for them.  

Each day is filled with some kind of Christmas related activity.  It doesn't have to big but it gives them something to get excited about each day!  You can find our advent activities from last year here and check out my blog on Friday for this year's plans.

Want to make one?  Here's what you will need:

A large canvas {mine is 24 x 24}

Cream and Red Acrylic Paint
Foam Brush
Painter's Tape
25 envelopes {I used a Making Memories pack for my envelopes but you could also purchase small envelopes or library pockets, create your own, or use a digital cutter}
Stamp pad {I used brown}
Chipboard or sticker numbers and other Christmas embellishments
Glue {I used Quick Grip purchased from Michaels}
Stencil or vinyl for the title

Okay, let's get started!

1. Using a foam brush, paint your canvas cream.  Let dry.

2. Using painter's tape, tape off approximately a 1/2 inch border on the front of your canvas.  Paint the sides of the canvas and the border red.  You will likely need a couple of coats.

3. To make the envelopes stand out a bit better, I inked the edges of all of mine with a brown ink pad.  It just gives it an extra bit of definition.

4. Lay out your envelopes on your canvas until you are happy with the arrangement.  Glue them down with the Quick Grip glue.  Add the numbers and any embellishments you would like.

5. I then used my Silhouette to cut out the 25 Days of Merry title.  You could also use letter stickers or paint your title on using a stencil.

6. Now fill up your envelopes with fun activities to get the whole family in the Christmas spirit!

We also have this magnetic calendar that we change up every month.  There are no activities on this one but it's still lots of fun! {and we actually have one more advent that gets filled with chocolate!}

Thank-you so much to Brandy for having me!  If you get a chance, I would love for you to stop by Clean and Scentsible to say hello sometime!

Thanks for stopping by Jenn!!

***

Here is  fun advent idea from Something from Cassie

And another from Infarrantly Creative

Homemade Advent Calendars {Day 5} Organized Living Solutions

Advent calendar DIY by Jutta from Organized Living Solutions!

Thanks so much Brandy for inviting guest bloggers!

I have been thinking about this year’s advent calendar but I hadn’t actually started, and December is coming closer quickly.

This was just the gentle push that I needed :).

My daughter loves to go on treasure hunts, so this year I decided to only put the clues into the calendar and hide the actual presents somewhere else. This is quite handy as it is very hot here this time of the year, and all chocolate would melt if left outside the fridge.

Crafts supplies are quite limited in Namibia and I normally don’t find what I have been looking for and have to improvise.

This is what I used for the calendar:

My trusted Russian-German dictionary (it is getting quite thin after I plastered several walls with its pages), small wooden pegs, brown envelopes used to pay out money to workers, little wooden numbers, glue, string, and some water colors

First I cut little hearts out of the pages of the dictionary

I started off by putting a pin into the little numbers to have something to hold onto when using them as stamps, but gave that up quickly and just used my fingers

I painted the little numbers red and stamped them onto the hearts

They didn’t have a ‘2’ at the crafts shop, so I made that one out of cardboard

After stamping the number on, I glued the heart to the envelope and closed it with a little peg

Using string and my daughter’s ‘Hello Kitty’ tape I put the calendar up in tree form and made a star on top out of the tape

If you like this, come and visit my blog  for more tutorials and other inspiration :)

Thanks for stopping by Jutta!!

 

 

Homemade Advent Calendars {Day 4}

I hope you ladies are enjoying the advent week here on Gluesticks so far! Today I thought I'd take my turn at sharing the advent calendar that I made for our family this year. At the end of the post I have a couple more ideas that we've used in the past!

 I had a lot of fun creating this fun advent/countdown for my kids!

My first thought was to mod podge paper on these clothespins, but I couldn't find any paper that I liked in my stash, so I decided to paint them. I would not recommend that! It took way too long! Next time I will just go and buy paper...lesson learned ;) I numbered each clothespin with a permanent marker after adding the detailing.  

 I bought a bunch of Christmas candies in bulk as well as mixed nuts for the kids to crack. The Palmer chocolate candies in bulk are my favorite this time of year! Especially the mint patties. I also made some cards to go inside of a few of the packages. Fun things to do at home or around town this time of year.

 I wrapped each little collection of nuts and candies with brown paper. I purchased a roll of it, but brown bags would work too. Then tied bakers twine around them and added a gift tag.

 There is one for each day until Christmas and they are already super excited about them. They don't know what is inside and are very curious.

***

Here are a couple of other ideas from our family!

Advent Gum Packs

Magnetic Advent Calendar