Christmas Crafts Round-Up from 2011 - 2013

Last week I did a round-up of some of our favorite Christmas books that really share the story of Christmas or the giving spirit. This week I thought I would share a round-up of the Christmas crafts we have done since Crafty Moms Share started. But before we share our past crafts here is a clip angel we made for one of Hazel's angel crafts from her Advent calendar this year. I was inspired by the Easy Paperclip Angel Ornament on Crafty Journal that I saw on Pinterest.

We used glittery pipe cleaners instead of ribbon and wooden beads instead of pearls.

I think the pipe cleaner made it easier for Hazel to do on her own. We made two before breakfast one morning. Now as I was going through my Christmas crafts of the past, I discovered I had too many for just one collage (Picmonkey wouldn't let me put them in one), so I made four. Two are general Christmas crafts, one is nativity crafts and one is "gingerbread" house crafts.

1) Felt  Peace Dove (Advent Week 2: Peace)
2) Paper Star Bag (Christmas Prep)
3) Felt Covered Ornaments
4) More Felt Covered Ornaments (Simple Christmas Ornaments/Decorations)
5) Snow Globes (apparently I didn't share these before, but they have liquid in them)
6) Painted Wooden Ornaments
7)  Painted Cardboard/Paper Mache Ornaments
8) Paper Advent Wreath
9) Coffee Cup Christmas Tree
10) Coffee Cup Angel
11) Kenyan-inspired Clay Ornaments
12) Kenyan-inspired Wire Ornament
13) Simple Christmas Cards (Operation Christmas)
14) Felt St. Nicholas
15) Felt Candy Cane Mouse (Holiday Stroll)
16)  Hope Ornament (Hope--First Week of Advent)

1) Felt Sheep
2) Our Salt Dough Ornaments
3) Angels, Angels Everywhere and Angels with a Toddler and  Some Angels
4) Pasta Wreath
5) Pasta Tree
6) Needle Felted Dala Horse
7) Needle Felted Elf
8)  Mini Advent Wreath (Advent Calendars -- Start of Advent)
9) Popsicle Stick & Button Trees
10) Button Tree Card
11) Straw Christmas Tree (Christmas Crafts for Kids ebook Review)
12) Snow Globes (Busy Day Getting Ready for Christmas)
13) Jingle Bell Crafts
14) Punched Paper Chain
15) Felt Ornaments
16) Fruit Candy Cane (Christmas Crafts for Kids ebook Review)
17) Toddler Fun Tongue Depressor Elf
18) Stick Reindeer (A Lovely Visit)
19) Christmas Book Ornaments (A Lovely Visit)
20) Beaded Wreath Pin
21) Winter Flower Fairies
22) Poinsettia Fairy
23) Painted Pine Cones
24) Applesauce and Cinnamon Ornaments
25) More Salt Dough Ornaments

Foam Trees and Gingerbread Men

Pine Cone Christmas Trees & Busy Weekend Slow Down

Beaded Candy Canes

Beaded Candy Canes

Nativity Crafts

1)  Nativity Bracelet (Oriental Trading Christmas Craft Kit Review)
2) Foam Nativity Kit
3) Cloth Nativity
4) Toilet Paper Roll Nativity (Focus on the Nativity and
5) Wooden Nativity Pieces (Advent Week 2: Peace and Advent Calendars--Start of Advent)
6) Craft Stick & Felt Nativity (Focus on the Nativity and Busy Weekend)
7) Felt Nativity Ornament
8) Needle Felted Nativity (Sharing Christmas and Needle Felting)
9) Treble Clef Savior (Hope--First Week of Advent)
10) Gingerbread Graham Cracker Creche (Hope--First Week of Advent)
11) Wooden Nativity Craft (Oriental Trading Christmas Craft Kit Review)
12) Nativity Earrings (Oriental Trading Christmas Craft Kit Review)
13) Colored Wooden Nativity (Operation Christmas)
14) Nativity Story Stones
15) Printable Nativity (Focus on the Nativity and Sharing Saturday with Free Printables)

1) Toddler "Gingerbread" House
2) Valentine's Day Gingerbread House
3) Valentine's Day Gingerbread House
4) Gingerbread Train
5) Christmas Prep 2012
6) Post Christmas Gingerbread House
7) Mortimer's Gingerbread House (Virtual Book Club for Kids: Mortimer's Christmas Manger)

Sharing Saturday 16-10

Reminder: This link party is for child-oriented crafts and activities and parenting/teaching posts!! 

It is time for Sharing Saturday!! This is a link party to share all of your child-oriented crafts, activities and lessons as well as your parenting and/or teaching posts. On Sunday night we also host Crafty Weekends for all your crafts (done by any age), patterns, and craft product reviews! It is the perfect place to share your creative side!! And the Creative Kids Cultural Blog Hop lasts all month for anything cultural or diversity posts!! Be sure to join us at it!!

 Thank you to everyone who shared at last week's party!!  I always love seeing what everyone has been up to and your creative ideas!! Our features are just a sampling of them so if you haven't checked them all out, you should! The features this week are Book Related and Everything Else. 

Fall is in the Air!!

So I know I promised a multicultural post, but Hazel has not been in the mood to craft and I haven't finished my craft yet enough to share with you, so hopefully tomorrow. Today I'm going to share a few fall things. Yes, I'm finally starting to get in the autumn mood.


We have been noticing the leaves have been starting to change in some trees. Which got us to talking about autumn and the tree fairies. So I wrote a little story about the change of seasons. You can get a pdf of it here:

Page 1                         Page 2

Autumn and Her Fairies

The cool breezes started to blow and Summer got worried. She always hated giving control of the weather to her older sister, Autumn. Summer watched as the squirrels and chipmunks scurried around to gather food and knew the time was getting near. Many of the summer flowers had already passed due to the heat she spread. The birds had already started to fly to the other hemisphere for warmer weather.  In the evenings she had trouble fighting the chill in the air and she saw buds on the mums. She was getting anxious. She had to stop the change of the season so she could stay awake and play more.

Summer loved playing with her friends. She loved going to the beach and watching the children play in the sand and in the waves. She loved seeing the beautiful flowers in the meadows and watching all the newborn animals grow. She often would play tag with the young animals and with the flower fairies. She loved the hot sunny days and the hot starry nights. It was so much fun to have the warmest season.

Summer always had a plan to stall Autumn.  This year she decided to have a beach party and invite all the fairies. If the fairies were distracted there would be no one to paint the leaves their new fall colors and surely Autumn would not be able to awaken.  If she could distract everyone with her party, then maybe no one would bother to wake her sister. She was sure this plan would work.

Summer sent out invitations to all of the fairies (well except the apple, mum and pumpkin fairies as she wanted them to stay asleep). Then she went to the beach to start planning, decorating and figuring out how to keep everyone there so they would not do their fall jobs.

The day of the party arrived, and everyone Summer invited arrived. There were lots of excitement. Many of the tree fairies had never been to the beach previously. They loved seeing the waves and smelling the salt air. Summer hoped they would all stay for at least a week. However the ocean breeze reminded them that Autumn would awaken soon and they needed to begin their painting project. The tree fairies are the ones that paint the fall leaves all the pretty colors, red, yellow, orange, etc. for Autumn. Autumn likes them to start with their painting before she awakens.  So at the end of the night the maple and oak and many of their siblings said their goodbyes and thank you to Summer and rushed off to get their paints and start changing the colors of the season.

Once again, Summer could not keep Autumn from waking up. Autumn woke on her own as she smelled apples in the air. Autumn often slept with her windows open and her room was beside an apple orchard. She looked out her windows and picked a nice big red apple and took a bite. It was so delicious and she was so excited to be in control again.

Autumn's first job is to put her little sister, Summer, to bed. Summer was trying to hide, but Autumn found her on the beach. She told her it was time for even the beach had to be prepared for their eldest sister, Winter. Play time was over and now it was time for preparation. All the animals, plants and living things must prepare for the harsher weather that was to come after Autumn had her time. She was proud to be one to help them prepare the most. She also loved all the reds, golds, browns and oranges around. The cool air and crunchy leaves always seemed to put smiles on the faces of those around her. Her tree fairies always did such a beautiful job painting the trees to new colors. She really felt sorry for her sisters, Spring and Summer. Spring got mostly green and Summer had the green and often it turned to brown. Nothing was as beautiful as her season.

After Summer was asleep, Autumn checked to make sure Winter was still sleeping soundly and then she went to check on the pumpkin fairies. She knew they had their big night at the end of October and wanted to make sure they were getting ready, especially Eve, known as The Pumpkin Fairy, who went and traded gifts for the candy the children gathered on that special night.

She also always checked on her apple fairies and turkey fairies. She knew Thanksgiving occurred and those both played such an important role. The cranberry fairies also would need to be visited at the bogs. She so loved that she was the one who got to see the harvest and the bounty of the other seasons. It was so fun to welcome in the cool and help everyone with their preparations.

So this fall, go look for Autumn and her fairies' work. When you begin to see them you know autumn is truly coming. Enjoy!

This morning Hazel wanted to make pancakes. Since we haven't cooked our pumpkins yet, we decided on applesauce pancakes and I cut up our last apple.

Then Hazel joined me for the measuring and mixing and a bit of the cooking.

Apple Pancakes

Makes: 15

Ingredients

	1 cup(s) whole wheat flour
	2 tsp baking powder
	1 tsp ground cinnamon
	1 tsp ground nutmeg
	1/2 cup(s) uncooked oatmeal
	1 large egg(s)
	1 1/4 cup(s) fat-free skim milk
	3/4 cup(s) unsweetened applesauce
	1 Tbsp olive oil
	1 small fresh apple(s), Diced
	4 tbsp Bob's Red Mill Organic Flaxseed Meal, Golden, 100% Whole Ground

Today she actually helped do some of the measuring! We measured out all the dry ingredients into a bowl and mixed them. Then measured the liquid ingredients in another bowl and mixed them.

Then we put the liquid ingredients and the diced apple into the dry ingredients and mixed. While Hazel was doing this I heated the pan with a bit of cooking spray on it. Then she helped me scoop the first batch into the pan.

She ate them with maple syrup and I spread them with applesauce. They were delicious!!

Crafts from Recycled Materials (Valentine Themed) -- Crafty Weekends Review & Link Party

Disclosure: I was sent these products to review free of charge from Quarto Books USA. All opinions in this post are my own. I did not receive any other compensation for this review. I am including links to each item for your convenience but do not receive anything if you purchase them.

Happy New Year!! Crafty Weekends has been on hold for a few weeks due to the holidays and Hazel's birthday parties. We are back this week with a review of two great children's craft books using things from your recycle bin!! I put a Valentine's Day twist onto the ones I made. I am also providing you with some free printable Valentines in case you do not want to make the crafts to go with them. 

Princess in Black and the Perfect Princess Party -- Book Review & Costume

Disclosure: Candlewick Press gave me an advance copy of this book free of charge to review. All opinions in my review are my own and I did not receive any other compensation. As in all my reviews I am providing links for your ease, but receive no compensation.

Have you discovered The Princess in Black yet? I wrote about our discovery of this amazing series back in July. Hazel chose The Princess in Black as her prize for finishing the Barnes and Noble Summer Reading Program. It had been a tough choice, but she was really glad with the outcome!! This became one of her favorite books ever. Then we discovered that a new Princess in Black book was coming out October 13th and from Candlewick Press--one of our favorite publishers. I asked for a review copy and they sent it right away. Can I tell you how excited Hazel was to have the second book in the series months early? Oh, my, she has been telling everyone about it. Anyway, today we are sharing The Princess in Black and The Perfect Princess Party by Shannon Hale and Dean Hale and illustrated by LeUyen Pham. 

A Day in Finland--Around the World in 12 Dishes

This month Around the World in 12 Dishes takes us to Finland. We had big plans to try lots of different recipes for this month, but our plans didn't work out completely. We did however enjoy making a wonderful Finnish breakfast called pannukakku. Our recipe came from the wonderful book, Easy Breakfasts from Around the World by Sheila Griffin Llanas. What I like most about the book is that it gives a little information about the country the recipe comes from as well as a bit about the recipe.

From this book we learned that Lapland, Finland's northern province is above the Arctic Circle, so in the summer the sun never sets and in the winter it never rises. Some Laplanders herd reindeer. We also learned that the capital city, Helinski is in southern Finland, but is the most northern capital city in Europe.

Pannukakku is described by the book as a baked pancake. It puffs up in the oven and sinks as it cools. It is often served with fresh fruit, whipped cream and powdered sugar. We ate it with fresh fruit since that is what we had at home. Steve described it tasting like a custard pie.

Pannukakku is an easy recipe using butter, eggs, sugar, vanilla, salt, flour and milk. I was tempted to add some cinnamon because we add it to everything, but wanted to stay traditional to the Finnish recipe, so we did not. It did not need it. We all loved it.

Next we did some coloring pages. We did the map, the flag and discovered lily of the valley is the national flower of Finland. It is one of our springtime favorites and is in bloom in our yard now.

Next we read some Finnish stories. In the Stories from the Sea, we read the Finnish story on why the sea is salty. Another legend/myth type story is When Bear Came Down from the Sky. The Princess Mouse is very much a fairy tale with similar story to the frog princess. Mika's Apple Tree is a wonderful story about a stubborn boy who works hard to grow an apple tree near his house even though his house is on a rocky point. This story involves sharing quite a bit about the country since his two uncles come to visit when his father is home and all three men have different jobs in different parts of the country.

We continued our look at Finland by listening to Lapin ai din kehtolaulu by Hannele Wida. It is the third song on the CD Lullabies for Kids from Around the World. We also read about birthdays in Finland. Birthdays Around the World by Mary D. Lankford, told us that Finland is smaller than the state of Montana. It has sixty thousand lakes and sixty-five islands. Plus forests cover almost three-fourths of the low flat lands and rolling hills. Daylight in the summer may last nineteen hours and when it does set it barely dips below the horizon.

In Finland a child's birthday celebration is important to the entire family. Birthday parties are usually held on Saturday or Sunday so everyone can attend. The Finnish tradition is to open gifts as soon as they are received. Finnish children sing "Happy Birthday to You" when they arrive at the door. A traditional Finnish birthday cake is three layers and is filled with fruit and whipped cream. The candles on the top are almost hidden by the whipped cream, candies, kiwis or strawberries. It is usually served after a celebration lunch. A popular Finnish birthday game is Onginta, which means Angling or Fishing. Each child takes a turn standing at a cloth held up by two adults. The child drops a rod attached to a line and hook over the cloth. An adult attaches a small basket on the hook and the child reels in the prize.

Our final exploration of Finland came from the book Going to School Around the World by Melissa Koosmann. In the third chapter, a boy named Matti arrives just in time for school in Finland. The chapter describes the day in Matti's life. Matti is in the third grade. School is free in Finland and all of the children receive a free hot lunch as well. During his school day there was science, math, Finnish language and literature, English language, physical education, music, arts and crafts and religion (the religion of his parents' choice). He had two recesses before lunch, but during the shorter fifteen minute one it was his turn to clean the classroom. For the arts and crafts they made coffee filter snowflakes and the desks were covered with food coloring so it took the full fifteen minutes to do the cleaning. The students address the teacher by his/her title, "teacher" in the morning greeting and when they are in trouble. All the other times they call their teachers by their first names. In the winter months they hold a mock Olympic Games with skiing. Matti's favorite winter sport is ice hockey though. After school Matti jogged home to stay in shape for hockey. He tried to play some computer games, but his father told him to do his homework. Since he did not have much homework, he was able to play computer games after finishing it and then he joined his father for dinner.

Matti looks forward to learning Sweden and another language in high school as well as learning more about computers. In third grade only the teacher has a computer in the classroom.  The book also gave the instructions to make the coffee filter snowflakes, so we did. Hazel decided her last one looked like the sun so we used red and yellow food coloring to color it instead of the blue.

That is how we explored Finland. Next month it will be Spain. Will you join us on that trip?

Here is the Finland passport and the Finland-themed placemat. 

Be sure to check out these great Finnish explorations and add your own here.

Oriental Trading's Fun365 --a Crafty Weekends Review & Link Party

Disclosure: Oriental Trading sent me these items in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. 

Have you discovered Oriental Trading's Fun365?  It is a site that has different craft projects and articles. There are choices of Party Ideas, Craft Ideas, Wedding Ideas, and Classroom Ideas. I was inspired by ideas from the Craft Ideas and Party Ideas. I had so much fun exploring the many ideas there. I let Hazel look and help me pick what we would try. In the Party Ideas section there is a Rainbow Party and one of the crafts is a DIY Rainbow Coin Purse. Instead of doing the coin purse we used DIY Totes. (See current available totes here.)I asked Hazel to paint a rainbow on one for me. She wanted to use the Pearlized Acrylic Paint (available paint). Then she wanted to do a heart rainbow, but hers turned out more like a circle. She also did a square but wanted to use the pink on it.  I did a heart one for her as well as a star and an H. 

Multicultural Monday: Natural Dyeing Part 2

Well, I have to admit, I was thinking about making Multicultural Monday a monthly thing. I feel like I have lots to share and never have the time to share it all, but then while doing research for my natural dyes, I found a great activity to share with you that tied right into my natural dyeing. (If you missed day one of my natural dyeing experiment, check it out here. Post 3 or day 2 is here.)

Besides of course the history you can share from China, Native Americans, Egyptian, as well as Europeans and the Colonists of America, I found this great short lesson/experiment on Teacher Vision. It has a nice introduction about how the Native Americans did natural dyeing. Then it has a short activity dyeing fabrics in plastic bags using carrots, beets and red cabbage. They have the student rinse and then use detergents to see which stays in the longest. You could also change it to different mordants (ie. white distilled vinegar, salt, alum). Some mordants will change the colors as well.

To make it even more educational, you can use this lesson from Teacher Vision titled Native Americans Contribution to American Culture. (Wow, some interesting things to think about there.) Also Folk Tales of Northeast Native Americans also from Teacher Vision. Here is a link to Teacher Vision's Native American lessons. (Can you tell I love learning about Native American cultures?)

1) Blackberries, 2) Sunflower Seeds/Blackberries/Beets, 3) Beets

Anyway, back to my craft. This is actually day 3 of my natural dyeing experiments. I wanted to share this one with you since it uses the carrots and beets from the activity mentioned above. To learn about my experience with red cabbage, you will have to wait until later in the week!

I did a lot of experimenting today with dyes and methods. I tried orange marigold flowers (from Hazel's fairy garden), sunflower petals and sunflower seeds, carrots, blackberries, and beets. Beets definitely were the most successful. Half way through the day I decided the sunflower seeds had not done anything, so I threw the yarn in with the blackberry mixture. At the end, the blackberries hadn't had enough time to do much to this yarn so I threw it into the beet dye and took it out maybe 10-15 minutes later. It came out a pale pink (see picture above--middle skein). The sunflower petals did not seem to be doing much either, so I added more and tried putting them in the food processor. At the end I threw them in with the marigold petals since it was a bit darker.  Oh, and our day started with breaking one of our big jars when we poured the beet dye in off the stove. Red dye all over my kitchen. Not fun!

I also experimented with method the past two days. Instead of always cooking the dye, I tried putting the fruit/vegetable or flower in with the mordant and then added boiling water. I did this to make it more kid friendly. Hazel just had to stay away when I added the boiling water. Today I did try to cook the beets, but as I explained I broke the glass so I went with the boiling water method.

1) Carrots, 2) Marigold, 3) Sunflower Petals/Marigolds

In this picture you can see the piece of original color so you can see all of them have a slight new shade. I think if I was to do this again I would let them sit over night in these dyes.

I will post Day 2 on Friday!! My mother has agreed to knit Hazel a striped sweater with all my home-dyed yarn!! She will actually finish the sweater unlike me!!

This is where I share...

Princess Hazel -- I See Me! Personalized Book Review for National Princess Week

* Disclosure: The Gymboree and Little Passport links in this post are affiliate links and I may earn a small commission at no cost to you.

Disclosure: I See Me! Inc.  gave me a copy of this book and ornament free of charge. All opinions in my review are my own and I did not receive any other compensation. As in all my reviews I am providing links for your ease, but receive no compensation.

Did you know there is a National Princess Week every April? It is always the last full week in April. It started in 2012 when Julie Andrews, Target and Disney joined together to create it. Julie Andrews's website says "Believe in yourself! Only then can you truly let your sparkle out for all the world to see." (Source) The website also has a post of 30 Ways to Celebrate National Princess Week.  We chose a fun way to celebrate and started a bit early. I See Me! sent us the Princess Personalized Book. All I have to say is Hazel was really excited when it came! 

Easter Bunny Crafts & More from Oriental Trading Company -- Crafty Weekends Review & Link Party

Disclosure: I was sent these items to review free of charge from Oriental Trading. All opinions in this post are my own. I did not receive any other compensation for this review. I am including links to the products for your convenience but do not receive anything if you buy from them.

Easter is only three weeks away!! It is early this year. I have been seeing so many cute bunny things this year and I wanted to jump on the band wagon. I asked Oriental Trading Company to help me make some fun bunny crafts and a few other Easter things. I fell in love with the bunny tote bag at work, but didn't want to spend the money on it since it looked easy enough to do a DIY if I had the canvas bags. So I asked for the DIY White Bags and got to work.  On one of them I hand stitched the eyes, whiskers and mouth and sewed on a pink pom pom (from Hazel's collection) for the nose. On the other I used fabric paint and glued on the pink pom pom.