Personalized Christmas ornaments

I’m piggybacking on Missy’s post about personalized Christmas ornaments today. (Don’t worry, Ellie’s birth story is coming soon.)

I love Christmas ornaments that have meaning to them, whether they are something a kid made, something that signifies a hobby we enjoy, something bought at a special place, or something with our names/pictures on them. You won’t find any plain colored glass balls on our tree.

I have a cross-stitched ornament for each year until I got married. Each one represents what I was into that year or something new I did, like beginning piano lessons or taking my first horseback ride. I would like to do something similar for my kids but cross-stitching (or any other such domestic arts) is SO not my thing. Missy’s winkflash ornaments gave me the idea that I could create something on photoshop with my digiscrapping supplies and have them printed on their cute ornaments. And if I win the $50 gift certificate winkflash gave her, that would be even better!

 

A last-minute St. Nick’s Day

So after spending hours on Friday writing and reading about stocking stuffers, did I make sure we had enough stocking stuffers for St. Nick’s day, which was yesterday? Nope, never even crossed my mind.

We didn’t celebrate this holiday growing up so I rely on Mark to remind me about it. Which usually happens about 10 p.m. Dec. 5. I thought I had some small items in the box of gifts for the kids but neither of us wanted to go to the garage to get them. After church and a lunch at Baja Sol yesterday, I pulled out the gifts, locked myself in my room and started wrapping. I didn’t come across enough stocking-sized items so I made an emergency shopping run to supplement the stash. I had to hit Family Dollar, Walgreens and Cub to get what I wanted. Probably would’ve been faster to go the extra distance to Target and get it all in one place, but that may have cost more. Either way, planning ahead would have been cheaper.

Grace discovers the full stockings

After watching Polar Express, Mark said “Hey Grace, I forgot that today is St. Nick’s Day.” Grace looks up at the stockings and says “Hey, something’s different up there. Those stockings are fat, like Santa’s belly.”

Despite the last minute shopping, everyone was happy with what they got. Even me, whose gifts were mostly just for show!

• Connor: Toy motorcycle from Family Dollar; Land Before Time DVD from Half Price Books; washable paint pens that were part of an auction basket I got early this year; crackers and chocolates.
• Grace: Snow White DVD I got on sale with coupon at Walmart when it came out this fall; press-on nails Mark picked up at Cub a while ago; a sticker set from Yellowstone that we found Saturday while scanning memorabilia from a 2007 trip; Tinkerbell crayon/paint set from Walgreens; black tights from Walgreens; crackers and chocolates.
• Mark: Travel coffee mug from Walgreens; hot chocolate packets from Cub; sample-size cologne from our closet.
• Me: Batteries from Family Dollar; sample-size lotion from our closet; herbal foot soak that I had bought as a treat for myself two weeks ago but hadn’t opened yet.

St. Nick's Day goodies

Me: Did St. Nick do a good job guessing what everyone wanted?
Mark: I don’t think he guessed. I think he knows.
Me: How did he know?
Grace: Maybe he’s in with Santa.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._nick%27s_day#Saint_Nicholas_Day

 

Almost Advent

A friend who is way more crafty than I am made this FABULOUS Advent calendar. And it got me thinking about we will do this year. Though I’m repulsed by all the Christmas decorations already up everywhere, I am prepared to start planning for Advent, which begins a week from tomorrow (Nov. 30).

We have an Advent wreath and maybe we’ll actually remember to light the candles this year. I am looking for something to do at the wreath though, rather than just lighting the candle and walking away. Anyone know of any preschool-age-appropriate prayers or activities to go along with the Advent wreath? Maybe something explaining what each week stands for? Maybe I can do some online searching for that tonight.

We have a Jesse tree set that my aunt gave me a couple of years ago but we’ve never used it. I need to dig that out and figure out what to do with it and when you start using it.

We’ve made attempts in the past to celebrate St. Nick’s day but they weren’t huge successes. This year I plan to get the kids a book about St. Nicholas and a DVD of The Polar Express.

I’ll let you know how many of these things we actually carry through on.

What Advent/pre-Christmas traditions do you all have?

 

Happy Halloween