Christmas Trees for Toddlers

Here is a cute idea for your little ones to do around Christmas time! I don't know about y'all, but I'm incredibly OCD about my decorations around the house... and the tree. Jocelyn likes to put everything all in one place. I had to constantly tell her to move stuff around last year while we were decorating our tree. And I still went behind her later on to move different things to empty spots on our tree. (I know, I'm bad! lol)

Anyway, I found this and thought it was an adorable idea to try out this year!

It is a felt Christmas tree for your kids to decorate however they please!!

I don't have a link for this to give you further information, I stumbled onto it on my Facebook and couldn't find a link through that.

BUT... It looks easy, right!? 

Get a large piece of green felt and cut it out in the shape of a tree then tack it onto your wall, with thumbtacks or maybe some fun-tack (that's the blue stuff you use to put up the glow in the dark stars with.) Then cut out ornaments of various colors in felt, and maybe some packages like they have here, and let the kids go to town! You could even do this for multiple children! Have them put up in each of their rooms and let them decorate them or something.

I'm taking mine a step further....

I'm thinking I'm going to use a big poster board for the tree. And the ornaments..... Well, you know all those strips and squares of wrapping paper that you have left over, the ones that are just too small to do anything with? Yeah, those.

I'm cutting out "ornaments" using those scraps!! Now I have a use for them!!! And the "ornaments" will be so much more fun for the kids to put up on their tree... They'll be sparkly, and shiny, and colorful!

I've been able to already start cutting out my circles for Jocelyn's tree because I'm wrapping empty boxes as props for my Christmas photo shoots for kids. So, I've been taking some of those and just cutting different sized circles out of them.

I can't wait to show Joc! She's going to be so excited!

I have solved two problems here... I love it! 1. "What to do with those wrapping paper scraps?" 

and 2. "How do I let the kids decorate their own way?"

Give it a try! I'm sure it'll be a fun new holiday tradition for your kiddos! :)

- Stephanie

Be Thankful

I discoverd a link on Pinterest just a few days ago... Did the normal thing, you know, Pin it and decided to read it later on, then keep scrolling. Well, I gave it a look through "later on."

It was a Pin on Thanksgiving mason jar crafts. Some of them were very neat, some of them not so much. I did, however find one that struck me! :)

A "Count your Blessings jar!" This is so awesome! (In my opinion.) I LOVE the Thanksgiving holiday! I don't think people give it enough time or credit anymore... I mean really!! Black Friday sales at Walmart last year kicked off around 8PM where I live.

Nobody gives this amazing holiday any time anymore... It's so sad! My family and I tend to go big for this holiday, too... tons of amazing, traditional, foods and lots of laughter around our table is how my night goes!

(I'm bad here, y'all.... I did go to the BF sale that started at 8. I know, I know. BUT who can resist all those sweet, sweet deals??? Especially with children involved! And the sad thing is, is that I'll likely go again this year at an early time in the evening.)

Anyway, THIS fun idea is something really great that I think could make your holiday so much more special this year. Take a jar, past a sheet of paper on it with instructions, have some card stock cut out for your family to write on, and you're done!

This jar is to be set out somewhere in your holiday atmosphere and have the cards next to it for everyone there to write on them something or some things that they are thankful for! Then you get the joy of reading the allowed at the dinner table over your fabulous feast with your family!

I'm so making this happen! It might even happen every year from now on! :)

Here is the link for where I found it, it also has the decorative printable for the mason jar for you! 

Blessings Jar

I hope that you find this fun holiday craft inspiring and motivates you to make your own for your families this year! We need to pay more attention to what we're thankful for, and to this wondrous holiday, that is upon us!

-Stephanie

All Smiles

Here's something absolutely adorable that you could do with your kiddos to celebrate fall/Thanksgiving, courtesy of: The Kids Activity Blog!!

Aren't these guys just too cute!!! And all you need are some festive looking leaves, a marker, some googly eyes, and some glue! You could so easily make these as Thanksgiving decorations for the kids tables or to leave around the house for your guests to admire and for you kids to brag to them about! :)

-Stephanie

A Baby Book Alternative

It has been an incredibly busy week this past week!!! I am so glad for it to be done. I hope that you all had a spooktacular Halloween holiday! We certainly did here! Enjoyed a fun, yet rainy, night filled with some awesome company, great food, and tons of candy!! Jocelyn seriously racked up this year! 
She did only get one vanilla tootsie roll, which made me very sad... I love those things and this is really the only time of the year that I get to enjoy them!

I have recently started writing in a journal... Not just any journal, but a journal to my sweet 4-year-old! She has been deprived of a baby book since she was born and that's really bothered me since I found out. Had I known her's wasn't up to date sooner I could have taken up the task of filling in everything, but it's just too late at this point to really be able to fill in everything. There were many things I didn't know to be able to fill in unfortunately. So. I'm making a journal for her! I don't think I've ever heard of anyone else every doing this for their child, but I thoroughly love this idea! I started it back at the beginning of October and have put in a good couple of entries thus far!
I've tried to write something in it once a week at the very least so far. I've wrote about some of her favorite things currently, and how me and her dad met, and a few other important past events that she should be able to know about. I also wrote updates on things that are happening her life that are special and exciting! Like how she started adding numbers for me the other day!! I couldn't believe it, she's four and can add numbers! It was seriously such a proud moment for me!
Starting this project has been such a rewarding thing for me to do for her! I've loved this so far... It feels so good to be able to share all these stories with her on paper for her to be able to read later on! I'm going to try and continue writing about special events in her life and then other stories I feel she should know about. The last one I wrote was about the man God intends for her to marry and how amazing he's going to be for her when they meet.
I plan on giving this book to her as a gift when she's older. Either as an 18th or 21st birthday present or as an engagement present for when she does finally meet that man God has made for her! I think this will be a million times better than having a baby book for her to look through when she's older!! :)

-Stephanie