Just in Time!

Well, here's what got finished up today. I'm so excited about it! It's our family Christmas quilt. The top 2 are my husband and me, and the bottom 2 are our little girls. Love it!

Christmas craft + toy = hours of entertainment!

I LOVE crafts that are cheap, easy, fun to do and provide my daughter something to play with. Can't get any better than that, right?

So start with a cookie sheet from the dollar store. Make sure it's a steel one, not aluminum. Magnets won't stick to aluminum.

Then I cut out a tree shape and Mod Podged it to the cookie sheet.

Then coat it with a thick layer of Mod Podge. I think this would look extra cool with the glitter Mod Podge, but I didn't have any on hand....

Now get out your scrapbook paper scraps, your buttons, rhinestones, and some magnet strips.

I cut out some to look like presents, and some to look like ornaments, and one for the star. I glued the paper to cardboard, then stuck magnets on the back and put a layer of mod podge on the top.
You can see the magnets on the back. Then I found my glitter glue (also from the dollar store) and embellished the ornaments and made ribbons on the presents. I glued rhinestone hearts to the buttons as well. Here it is, all ready for a little girl to play with!This was so easy to create, it was cheap, and it will store relatively flat when she's not playing with.

My daughter has really enjoyed it. I'm thinking of lots of variations for her to play with!

Reindeer Christmas Craft

Yesterday my older daughter asked to do a craft with handprints.

(Actually, first she used a magenta marker to coat her palms, got frustrated when they didn't make handprints, stomped around a little, THEN she asked to do a craft with handprints...... ahem... where were we?)

Oh yes, the craft with handprints. So here's what you'll need:

• a canvas big enough to accommodate your largest kiddo's foot + a few inches for antlers
• pom-poms for noses
• paint (background color + 2 colors of brown)
• a Sharpie marker
• pom-poms for eyes or googly eyes
• small jingle bells
• ribbon
• some sort of Christmas decoration-type stuff to fill space on your canvas. I used snowflake ornaments from the dollar store

Most of that stuff I had on hand or had in my dollar-store stash.

First, paint your canvas. I didn't bother with the edges since I was planning to put ribbon around the sides. Next, find your little ones. Paint one foot on each kiddo and stamp it. Then paint both hands and have them make "antlers" for their reindeer. It actually works better if it's a little haphazard, so don't worry if it's smudgy.
(Kind of looks like a mess here. But don't worry. It's all going in the right direction!)

Next, get out your Sharpie marker and outline. This gives some definition to your shape, and it gives you a chance to make your antlers really look like antlers.

Next we start gluing like crazy (hot glue worked well). I added:

• red pom-poms for noses
• eyes
• jingle bells on the antlers

Then get out the ribbon and glue it all around the edge. I added a big bow at the top, and since I have 2 little girls I put bows on both reindeer.

It still needed something, so I glued on some fluffy snowflakes from the dollar store.

There you go. A fun, easy, cheap Christmas project!