Christmas Tree's revisited

This is a project from last year. Mandee did them and didn't they turn out darling? What a fun craft, I had to reshare this. If your interested in making it, please visit this post. I wanted to share it early enought that you would have time to make some!

Christmas Card Bouquet

How many of you are getting bombarded with christmas cards and pictures? I love receiving pictures and greetings from family and friends that we don't see very often. I like to display them through the season and was looking for a creative way to do so.

I came across this idea in my 6 yr old daughters nick jr. magazine and thought it was adorable and clever. I just filled a vase with green shredded paper and taped the pictures to wooden skewers. Now instead of covering my wall, fridge, or windows I can display the greetings in a cute way without leaving traces of tape behind when it is time to take them down! BayLee had a great time helping me do this. Thanks Nick Jr for a great idea!!!

Some of my Favorite Holiday Decorations

What to post, what to post? I thought it would be fun to share with you a few of my favorite holiday decorations and why I love them so much.

What would Christmas be without a nutcracker? I got this one last year on clearance. He is so much fun. He plays music and his leg and head move. We try to go to the Nutcracker every year, as our cute little neighbor is in it. We didn't make it this year and that was sad, but sometimes life gets in the way.

I have a ton of nativities. I love them. I love how each one is different, but each depicts the same glorious event. I have 7 of them and every year since I have been married I have tried to buy a new one. I also have several pictures set up in beautiful frames. I think that they are beautiful. I think being a mother makes you appreciate the beauty of the scene even more. I love depictions of the Christ Child and the way that His mother, Mary holds him so tenderly and looks at him with so much amazement. Had He been a child of normal birth, she would have still loved Him and looked at Him with the same adoration, because she was His mother. Don't we all look at our children that way?

All the stockings you will find, hanging in a row... This was a gift the 2nd Christmas that Josh and I were married. His mother gave it to us and it is something that he had from his childhood. She made it when she first was married and it has their last name across the top. Being that Josh is their only son, we got it. We do have a wood burning stove, but no mantle. The two Burgundy stockings that are kind of hiding are also favorites of mine. Those were a wedding present. They are crocheted and they are so alike, yet each one is unique. Beautiful addition to our holiday memories.

I love Snowmen! Although I have oodles of Snowmen decor, this is one of my favorites. Another D.I. treasure.

This is probably my very favorite holiday decoration, other than my new picture! I picked this up at a yard sale several years ago. I paid $20.00 for it, which is way more than I would normally spend. I had to have it, though. So cute!! It's made out of fence material. Someday, when I have time, I want to mass produce them for my family present. Already have something planned for next year, so it will have to be Christmas 2010.

I love the word Believe! It can imply to holiday spirit, Santa Clause, and also the birth of the Savior. Believe in what you will!!! I love the Polar Express, because of the theme and the idea that it passes onto our children. BELIEVE in the magic of Santa, believe in the unseen, believe in friendship, believe in others, believe in yourself!!

Have a great weekend everyone! We'll be back next week!!

So we usually do little, tiny, gingerbread houses. We use the milk carton as the base and it's a lot of fun. My friend, Shirley said that she premakes the houses, but that instead of frosting she hot glues them together! What a wonderful idea, I thought.

They look good and they were super sturdy, but it was not as easy as I thought it would be. First of all my thumb on my left hand will never be the same again!! I lost count of how many times I burned, it but it was a lot. I had a hard time getting the initial wall standing up because all it was glued to was the cardboard. Somehow I made the first one work.

On the second house I ended up using Popsicle sticks as braces. It made the second one a little bit easier to glue together. It took me forever to makes these. It was about 1 & 1/2 hours in the making. I also went through a ton of glue sticks. Shirley must have it down to a science, because it was nowhere near as easy as I had pictured it.

The finished product. Not as cool, as I would have liked them to have been, but they worked and they were very sturdy. No collapsing walls or caved in ceilings. They held up well to the frosting and the kids decorating them. We used regular old frosting from a jar this year and it did not work as well for putting the candy on. Here is a great recipe if you need a really stiff frosting for decorating.

2 eggs whites

1 pound Powder sugar

½ tsp. cream of tartar

Beat egg whites until stiff and add tartar and mix. Then add powder sugar and mix until creamy and stiff. Put in plastic baggies and cut the tip of the bag at the bottom corner to create a frosting bag. You can add food coloring to your frosting to add a little bit more color. Remember not to eat this frosting. It is for decorating only! Probably wouldn't hurt ya, but better safe than sorry!

We used this frosting for our Haunted Houses this year and it works really well. I don't think I will do regular frosting again. Just didn't work as well.

Messy, but fun! The kids love to decorate them and we have the tradition of taking them out and using them for target practice after the holiday 's!! Dual purpose! And they make for such festive holiday decor.

Mandees Christmas Tree

I know what you are thinking!! It is time to take the Halloween decorations down. Well, we decided to do something different this year. After 11 Christmases together, my husband came up with a new tradition this year-do a different themed tree each year. I think it sounds great-kinda crazy- but great. His birthday is Christmas day so I decided what the heck, I will let him choose this years theme.
The day after Halloween we were out on a date cruisin Target(what we call a date) and we were checking out the clearance for Halloween decorations. They were pretty much GIVING things away. My husband, Mr D., looked at me and said "Let's do our tree in the Nightmare before Christmas theme". I thought it was a wonderful idea and my oldest daughter LOVES this movie. We had so much fun shopping for the tree, we wanted to come straight home and decorate!
I made ornaments for the tree too.
*Since I originally did this post, I have entered a contest over at Tip Junkie. Go check it out!!!



These are the ornaments. I took Balsa wood,(used for rc planes-Mr D. has TONS) and printed out images from the movie. After that I used,any guesses?????? Of course, MODGE PODGE! I modge podged the images onto the wood and got this cool yarn from the Dollar Store. It was so much fun and it will look great on a garland for Halloween next year.

We found these darling little pumpkin and skeleton plaster baskets that we used as ornaments too. We also used Skeleton and spider garland instead of ribbon or rag garland. Again we will be able to use the garland for Halloween next year too.
We found the very last white illuminating pumpkin at Walmart. I dug and dug for it. It makes the perfect tree topper!

Here is the finished product! We used orange and purple lights and minature pumpkin lights. I know that this isn't "traditional" but we are really enjoying it. It is fun doing something different. I told my husband it has to stop at the tree so Christmas will be felt in our home! I wonder what the theme will be next year?............