Getting Caught Up

It's been a really busy week, but I'm beginning to feel less behind on my life. We had Thanksgiving at our home as normal. Amy picked up my mom in the morning, so she was able to celebrate with us. After a huge meal, we all played Uno and Crazy Eights for a couple of hours in the afternoon. Mom and I spent a couple of hours talking. She's really struggling with depression. The chemotherapy causes depression and her life is really stressful right now. I will need to make a more concerted effort to get over to her house regularly to help keep her spirits up.

At 6:00am Thanksgiving morning, I went shopping to get the sale items that will be Christmas gifts. There were more sales at 12:01 Friday morning that I had planned to get, but my stomach was upset from the rich food, so I skipped that sale.

The early Black Friday sales were easy to get at 6:30 this morning. The differences between shopping in our former city and our current small town are huge. I parked 3 cars away from the front door. Received assistance from a sales clerk for the items I needed and was second in line at the register. All of my shopping completed in less than 1 hour! Amazing!!!

The kids slept until 10 this morning and then helped me put up one of the Christmas trees. We will put up the second tree tomorrow afternoon. The furniture is a little cramped in the family room, but it almost always is during December. The gifts also got wrapped this afternoon.

Wednesday, the kids and I cleaned house and got all the laundry and ironing completed. It is so much easier to do the Christmas decorating when all the normal chores are up to date. I'm so thankful for my wonderful, cheerful helpers. Thanksgiving would have been a lot more stressful without them this year.

Katie has offered to watch the younger girls for the afternoon, so I can get so much needed sewing completed. What a great daughter!

Snowman Craft

These snowmen are so easy to make.

Supplies:

Men's white ankle sock
fiber fill
scrap material
buttons
permanent marker
glue

Fill the sock with fiber fill.



Tuck the ends of the sock up into the snowman.



Cut a piece of fabric 1" x 14" tie around snowman's neck. Pull tight enough to create the head of the snowman.

Cut a rectangle of fabric 2 1/2 times the width of the snowman's head and 7" tall.

Fold the fabric in half and sew up the width, using 5/8" seam allowance. Fold up one edge 1/2" twice. This will form the bottom rim of the hat.

Place the hat on the snowman. Use string to tie the hat closed at the top. I also tied raffia over the string, for a more festive look.

Use permanent marker to draw nose, eyes, and mouth on the snowman.

Glue buttons on the body of the snowman.

Pine Cone Christmas Tree Craft

It's holiday crafting time! The younger kids and I made rustic Christmas trees using large pine cones, colored pasta, pompons, shiny ribbon, pony beads, and glue. To dye pasta, simply put food coloring in rubbing alcohol and add uncooked pasta. After the pasta reaches the desired color, remove from color solution. Allow to dry. The trees went together really quickly and the girls were thrilled with their results.

Sewing Projects

Yesterday was spent in the sewing area completing some Christmas gifts and household items. Here's what was accomplished:

1 lined kitchen curtain with rick-rack edging for the new house.
1 lined dining room curtain with piped edges for the new house.
1 pair of pajamas for Mike for Christmas (I think they will be too large).
2 Christmas kitchen towels.


2 kitchen towels for the new house.


1 nightgown for Allie for Christmas.


I plan to get a lot more gifts completed today. There is only three more weeks before I pack up the sewing supplies until the new year. It's too stressful to try and sew and do all the Advent and Christmas activities.

Simple Pine Cone Craft, Ummm

The local Joann's store has a large pile of cinnamon pine cones stored in their entryway. The smell is wonderful,albeit overpowering. A small bag of pine costs almost $5 and I'm cheap. Today, I discovered a huge plastic storage bin filled with pine cones that we had collected several years ago.

I baked the pine cones for 1 hour in a 250 degree oven. After they had cooled, Madelyn sprayed the pine cones with clear polyurethane. After they had dried, we placed small batches of pine cones in a large metal bowl and sprinkled them with cinnamon oil.

My whole house smells faintly of cinnamon. The children and I placed baskets and small bowls of pine cones throughout our living spaces. After Thanksgiving, we'll be adding small pine branches and red bows to the containers.

About 1/2 of the pine cones were used. Now, to think of ideas for the rest of them.

Thanksgiving

We had my mom over for Thanksgiving and did our annual evening walk at the local "Festival of Lights" downtown. Buses of tourists have been coming to walk down by the river and see the great light display. This year we missed the big parade and lighting ceremony due to rain and feverish children.

Thanksgiving evening was a huge disappointment. One city block was decorated on three streets. The huge display of the 12 Days of Christmas riverwalk was not up. Many of our favorite areas were dark. The kids were discouraged and renamed the display the "Festival of Light" I promised to take everyone to a neighboring city to see a larger display, but haven't gotten around to doing it yet. Thursday evening, I was driving through downtown and noticed that the city has continued to put up more light displays! The kids and I are planning to rewalk the Festival with our college student returns home for Christmas! I take back everything I said about the stupidity of the city council and the misuse of taxpayer money :)