Christmas is Getting Close - Hooray

Even if I didn't have kids, I would still be excited about the prospect of Christmas looming.

This week we've really been into our Christmas crafts.  This is a picture post so I hope you enjoy!

James decorated the pine cones.

 He wore Matthews old plastic apron that has been saviour many a time through the years.

 Then with our pine cones and the basics of white glue, paintbrushes, gold glitter and ribbon we set to work.

 Originally we were both painting on glue but it was a very slow process so I became cheif gluer and James became official glitterer!

James did enjoy playing with the glitter and did a really good job,

That same evening Matthew had a go at doing some crafts. His job was to do the paper chains:

He sat himself down and really got to the task in hand.

As the chain grew, so did his confidence. He really enjoyed doing this and made the full pack of 100 adhesive paper strips.

My job was the cookie baking. I found an old easter chick cutter that in this case became a Christmas robin.

I made a basic water and sugar icing (glaze) and covered the cookies with a layer of the glaze and on one side covered them with some 100's and 1000's sprinkles.

Next I threaded the ribbon throught the cookies and coated the other side with same glaze before adding some star decorations and the remainder sprinkles when the stars ran out.

 Hubbys part in all this was to get the tree. He went to a local tree sales place and bought a lovely 8ft tree for a VERY good price. This is where high ceilings are a real treat!

 We went out and picked our new lights. White flashy ones and James got in the spirit by wearing some paper chains.

This is the finished article. Our Homemade tree decorations. We feel that the Angel on top doesn't quite suit it but it will do for this year.

Of course, I have missed out on one little person and his participation in the Christmassing up of the house. Liam just said "Wow" and "I like Dat!" in all the right places. That's all my little boy needs to do to show me he approves and has enjoyed seeing all the bustle of the house in the past 4 days.

I have enjoyed the experience doing this but I think next year it will save a lot of time and money to buy decorations to reuse. We can still make the paper chains and reuse the cones. This is one of those things I always wanted to do as a kid but never got to do. My kids will never say the same! It may be good to do something similar in a couple of years so Liam can participate more.