Christmas is fast approaching ...

I am surrounded by Christmas paper, smells, lists, food, and projects, this is normally one of my most favourite times of the year. On the outside I am smiling and doing loads of Christmas crafts and activities with my kids, on the inside I am screaming, crying, and rocking in the corner. It's so much harder than I imagined it to be. Jason is CONSTANTLY in my thoughts, and just thinking about how he isn't going to be here for Christmas makes me cry. I'm crying writing this post. I think back to last Christmas and we were so excited because all the things Jason had sent over from his time in America were going to be able to be wrapped and given to the kids finally. We had bought the kids a trampoline and we had loads of laughs (and a bit of swearing!) putting it together on Christmas Eve. This year I bought Riley a new bike which his Uncle is going to put together for him, not his Dad. Sigh ... I can pretend to be happy for only so long but in all honesty I am wishing Christmas could be cancelled this year, I'd like to sleep through December and most of January. Sadly that can't happen so instead I listen to sad Christmas songs and think of how much I wish my husband was here to help celebrate Christmas with us.

Kids Christmas Crafts

The kids and I had sooo much fun making a Handprint Christmas Wreath for Grandma yesterday! Was sooo much fun!

Here's what we did ...

Step #1
Make LOTS of hand prints! We used a lovely dark green colour



Step #2
While the paint was drying the kids punched out lots of different shapes with Christmas paper, we used a Star, a scalloped heart and a scalloped circle.




Step #3
Cut out all the hands



Step #4
From thick cardboard cut out a ring ... I used a dinner plate as a template



Step #5
Stick all the hands to the ring, I used double sided tape, making sure the fingers overlap the hands, then attach the punched shapes



And then it's all done!!

Mini Christmas Album - Tutorial of sorts!!

Well Finally after much procrastinating and avoiding I finished my mini Christmas album!! And I am actually really happy with it!!



and this is how I made it ....

First I got the Bo Bunny BELIEVE Album from Crafty Tart (and it was and still is on special!!) And I also bought my papers from Crafty Tart. They are Echo Park's 'Everybody Loves Christmas' range which I just LOVED! (also all on special!!)
So first thing I did was decide which papers I wanted to use, because the papers are all double sided it made it sooo much easier to use less and have more patterns! And the cool thing I discovered as I was making this album was the longest letter E was a perfect fit across a 12"x12" paper! Brilliant!

STEP #1
Trace your letter shapes. I traced the opposite side of the album onto the back of the paper I wanted, clear as mud?? I do it this way because I'm lazy and don't like erasing pencil lines!!



Don't forget to trace your little holes!!



STEP #2
Then you cut out your shapes.
Pretty easy so far right!



STEP #3
Cut out your holes, I used my Crop-a-Dile, but you can use a hole punch or a craft knife or a fork even!!



STEP #4
Glue your paper to the chipboard. I glued the back of the paper with Modge Podge and then carefully flattened it out on the chipboard, using a ice block stick I flattened all the bubbles and creases and made it all flat and nice!



STEP #5
Trim the excess paper. There always seems to be some! I used my Fiskars Fingertip Craft knife



STEP #6
Sand all the edges. This makes the edges smooth and also takes off any more excess paper that the knife couldn't get. I used some emery boards for this, but you can get lots of different things to do this, sandpaper, file ... there is a really cool Tim Holtz Sanding Block too!



STEP #7
Ink all your edges. I used a cotton bud for all the fiddly in between bits the ink pad wouldn't reach.



Step #8
Embellish!!! This is the fun bit!! I used Stickers and papers from the same Echo Park Range, as well as a few Kaiser Christmas Rubons, one of my new Heidi Swapp word Stamps and the odd ribbon, button and other random embellishment!
Put it all together with Binding Rings and tie some fibres/ribbon onto the rings and you are done!!

Christmas Procrastination

It's 3 weeks until Christmas I have LOADS of gifts to make, crafts to do, things to organise and what do I do? Do I knock off several of the things on my TO DO List? No I do not I add two new things ... and spend the WHOLE day working on them and this I call Christmas Procrastination ... I did say earlier in my Domestic Goddess post that I was easily distracted right!!??
Well I had this idea of making Christmas T-Shirts for the kids last week. Yesterday I picked up a couple of red $4.99 T-Shirts from T'n'T and I thought I'd get some of that printable iron on transfer stuff. Well that was until I saw a T-Shirt my mate Hilary made for her son, that changed my mind and I decided to make the shirt decorations myself .....




Thanks Hilary for the inspiration!!! I like the Gingerbread Man one best, the kids both love them so that's the main thing! I have also decided when I have time (or want to procrastinate from what I SHOULD be doing) I might try doing some more plain T-Shirts the kids have in a less Christmasey theme, was thinking robots, monsters, fairies & Birds ... we will see how we go!!

Now back to work on the things I have on my list!!!

Christmas Traditions

Do you have any? We don't have many .. I wish we had more.
Jason and I started a Tradition when Riley was born. We took a Christmas photo of Riley to put on the Christmas card. It was inspired one year by my friend Jill who's Christmas card had her kids adorned in tinsel and ornaments and I LOVED the idea, so every year from then the kids have had a Christmas Photo Shoot and the favourite picture was on the front of our cards. Now my good friend Jennie makes Christmas CD decorations every year, one decoration for each kid each year, I thought that was a fantastic idea when she first showed me. This Year Jennie put photos on her Cd's and I was like OMG!!! And a new Christmas Tradition has being born for me! I am now going to make a Christmas CD Decoration each year with our Christmas photo! Here are the decorations I have made 2005 - 2010









Thanks so much Jill & Jennie for your inspiration! So what do you all have as Christmas Traditions? Share with me .. you never know someone might just start up a new tradition all because of you!!

opps!!

For some reason I missed some of the Christmas ornaments I recieved ... so here are the missing ones!





and since I didn't have a Christmas Tree when I took the photos a pic of them all on my Tree outside!!

Happy Christmas!

I Love Summer

It is my Favourite time of the year ... You have kids in shorts/skirts, swimming, summer fruit!!! - peaches, nectarines, strawberries, melons, cherries, plums, apricots ohhh my mouth waters at the thought! Christmas, beaches, BBQs, I just love everything about Summer.
Today finally feels like Christmas, we got our tree today and the kids had fun decorating it. I am sitting here in the dark with the Christmas lights on (and a few Christmas candles) and I can smell the tree and the candles and ahhhh smells like Christmas!



This year I got involved in a Christmas Ornament Swap. You make 10 ornaments and post them off and get 10 different ones in return. I made my ornaments from Cd's an idea I got from my Friend Jennie I was completely blown away by the AMAZING ornaments I have so far received in the letterbox. There are some amazingly talented ladies out there!
These are mine ...




and these are the amazing ones I have received in the post so far ...








Something else that I love about Summer is the garden! I have the most awesome Veggie Garden at the moment and OMGoodness the flowers I have around are simple stunning!







Nothing beats home grown veggies!!!

So I am also part way through making a few different Christmas Projects so watch this space! And I have a couple tutorials coming .. and I can't wait to show you my Homemade Christmas Presents!!