Merry Christmas!

unaltered

I have had a little pile of my grandmother's vintage hankies lying around for a while now.  I knew I wanted to do something with them, but I just wasn't ready to cut and sew.  I have a set of reproduction hankies that my daughter hangs up under her fort down stairs after she irons them.  She has been doing this religiously since the age of two, and I didn't want to take her hankies either. 

Today

 however, I finally figured out what to do!

Tie them together.

Hang them up, and be done!

This way they can be easily untied and back as they were.

It looks really cute over the little lady's bed.

fairy door

A while back a friend sent me a link to little fairy doors that you can buy on etsy.

I hadn't thought much more about it because although cute, they were a little pricey.

That is until I saw this tacky photo album at the thrift store for under $2.oo

Initially I was  just going to remove the photo inserts and glue it shut,

but it looked goofy sitting out so far from the baseboard.

What kid was going to fall for that?

So I took the front part of the door off the little hinges

and simply stuck it up on the wall with my handy dandy command strips.

It is pretty cute,

and it would make a perfect little door for your Elf on the Shelf during Christmas.

on target

what I had.

squirmy kids who like to shoot at each other.

an embroidery hoop.

extra fabric.

what I made.

a target.

the center is polyester,

so if you have the velcro darts, they sometimes stick.

this is going to come in handy this winter.

Great Grandma Rena's earrings

They started off as dress up, but wouldn't stay clipped on little ears.

Some ended up as magnets, and a few turned into headbands.

I used hot glue instead of E6000 so that we can (peel them off and) reuse them when

she won't wear these headbands anymore. 

who's sock is it anyway?

Keeping the stockings straight at our house seems to be important.

Even though Santa doesn't get credit for filling them here,

the kids wanted something identifying.

I didn't really want to put their names on them,

so I borrowed their initial ornaments from the tree. 

 Now there should be no confusion. 

frosty

Last year the middle man made this snowman from 2 embroidery hoops.

The only thing I helped with was pulling the fleece tight and monitoring the use of hot glue gun. 

He found an old knit pillow cover to use for the scarf and hat.

He was asking for his snowman as soon as the decorations started to come out of the attic.  He seems to be very proud.

The fact that frosty hangs on his bulletin board along with everything else that is dear to him says so. 

scrap garland

This is so easy, my 7 and 9 year old boys can make them.

Cut strips out of an old felted wool blanket,

then cut squares from the strips.

Line them up and start sewing a straight stitch feeding the pieces in as you go.

Don't cut off the extra thread at each end,

you can tie it off and use it to hang the garland.

I once was a lampshade

If you have an old lampshade with good bones

and fabric scraps that you can't part with...

 this is the project for you.

Simply remove the old shade.

Wind long fabric strips around the wire and hot glue or tie off to secure.

Add some ric-rac or ribbon tails, maybe beads, and you're done! 

This would be a fun rainy day project for the kids.

You could easily make it boy by

changing the colors and finding

little trinkets like soldiers, or dinosaurs to tie onto the ends.   

Another way to celebrate the season of Advent

We have already started our Jesse Tree and talked about why we celebrate Advent.

Here is another simple way to celebrate.

E found this mirrored tray at the thrift store,

she added 4 candles, and every week they light one more candle in the anticipation 

of Jesus' birth.

The candle light looks so great reflecting off of the tray,

and it is such a simple visual way for the kids to countdown to Christmas day. 

sweater better

I think we all have one of these in our collection.

It is probably really comfortable,

and possibly on the frumpy side as well.

One of us gilly girls has a great sense of style, and I am not her.

This is how E made her sweater worthy of the racks at Anthropologie.

One simple cut right up the center.

In our tradition, a little lace and a doily make anything better, right?

Finish off the unfinished edge any way you please, and you're on your way! 

old scarves come full circle

I apologize that my before picture for some reason would not upload...

This is a pretty simple upcycle though,

and I think that you can imagine what these scarves might have looked like as they were.

It's not that I didn't like the scarves, I just didn't wear them.

One was a scarf I had knit a long time ago and it was too skinny, the other was just blah.

Now that everyone is wearing infinity scarves,

I decided to make my own.

One simple line stitch later, 

end to end, and they were done!

One on the machine, the other by hand.

Couldn't have been easier.

Annalea Hart

Says it well.

"Did you know that the word "Advent" comes from the Latin word adventus, which means "coming." (We love us some Latin around here! :) ) Despite what it may feel like at the mall, Advent is the commemoration of the coming of Christ--the Messiah, and the anticipation of the Second Coming of our Lord! It's what all  the hustle and bustle is ultimately all about--it's what we are preparing for...in our hearts and in our homes."  
-Annalea

I know that my kids love dissecting the Latin they are learning at school and applying it to everything!

It is so simple, let's all slow down and focus our hearts this December. 

roll with it

What?

An old daddy shirt and a roll of paper towels.

It all started as we were trying to figure out how to display our handbands for sale...

I bet you didn't know that a roll of paper towels is just about perfect!

Because it isn't the prettiest of displays, we decided to do what we are best at...

I am pretty sure that both of our closets must live in fear of what will bite the dust next,

if we can't find what we need in our scraps, the closet is the next stop.

Sleeves work perfectly for this project, it makes it no sew!

Just cut off at both ends and slide over the roll of paper towels.

We chose to take the plastic off, it just feels nicer and is less noisy that way.

Tuck your ends in and hot glue to the cardboard roll.

We used felted wool to cover the ends.

You could do this in so many ways,

however cutting small strips and gluing them on as a "flower" 
proved to be really quick and cute.

Once the little lady saw our displays, she asked for a red one for her room.

Our Advent tradition

 Many people go through great lengths to prepare for Christmas yet fail to appreciate the true meaning of the season.  Advent, if thoughtfully observed, can help us to realize what this season is truly about. 

The Jesse tree represents Jesus' family tree. The name is taken from Isaiah 11:1, in which Jesus is referred to as a shoot coming up from the stump of Jesse, the father of David. The ornaments on the Jesse tree tell of Jesus' ancestors, and of the events leading to Jesus' birth. Even though we can have Peace and Joy through the presence of Jesus Christ, we still long for deliverance from the oppression of sin in the world. We long for the full reign of the King, and the Kingdom of Peace that He will bring. So, while we celebrate the birth, the new shoot from the stump of Jesse, we still anticipate with hope the Second Advent, and await the completion of the promise.

The Jesse Tree helps us retell this story, and express this hope.

 Every year the kids look forward to putting up the Jesse Tree.

We read our devotional every night starting December 1st.

Every night we put up a new ornament corresponding to the Bible story we read.

Many years ago, the mom's in my small group each made several of the ornaments on cardstock and had them laminated.

These have worked fine for the last several years,

but I have been hoping to make smaller fabric ornaments instead.

I made them all in one morning.

They are not perfect, but they will do the job just fine!

This is what we have always used to keep the ornaments in.

I made it out of a vintage tablecloth and felt numbers.

This is our Jesse Tree, but you could use anything, even a branch.

We are all looking forward to filling it very soon!

in need of a stocking

I was told the new puppy needs a stocking.

However, I really couldn't justify going out to buy one.

I had a sweater, and an idea.

Hazel the Great now has her stocking to be filled at Christmas.

I used to be a scarf

I used to be a scarf, a pin, and a few strips of wool.

The great thing is,

that the pin can come off,

the yarn is just tied on,

and you could reinvent the wreath as much as your little heart desires.