It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas ... well in 230 days

i know, i know! it's not Christmas  - only 230 days to go though.  I thought I'd put this on because I may just do somethings differently next year and add to what we have.

Last Christmas we did a few advents - there was making Santa's beard :-

 
The poem that was on Santa's beard was -
       Santa's beard is very bare,
     On his chin, there is no hair.
               So each day
       Add one puff of white,
     And when they're all on
       He'll come that night

                                            For our jar of wool :-
                                                       Santa's beard is very bare
                                              He can't come to visit, without any hair.
                                                       So take a ball and stick it on
                                                   and don't forget to sing my song

We sang When Santa Got Stuck Up The Chimney and made up actions for it too.  JD loved doing it every morning.

JD and i did lots of hand crafts hand painting, using salt dough and other bits and pieces.

Hand prints on mini canvases

JD made this one (i painted them all as it was easier and JD got annoyed with the paint)

These are all of our finger prints,  JD's at the top, mine in the middle and dad's on the bottom :)






JD's foot print made into Santa's sleigh. He really loved this one :)







 JD's handprint made to look like snowmen and his fingers for a reindeer

  I do love this one - he used his toes to do this one and then we made a weird shaped manger (5 legs hmmmm!)

These are amazing too - Santa's sleigh and reindeer and Christmas Tree.All you need is a canvas and paint - brown, red, green and yellow for the basics and any other colour you want for   presents.


To make Salt dough you use flour, salt and water.  3 simple ingredients that everyone has on hand.  The ratio for salt dough is 2:1:1 so -

2 cups flour
1 cup salt
1 cup water.
                     
mix all the ingredients together, if its to sticky add some more flour
roll out the dough and cut your shapes

there are different ways that you can get them to harden - oven, microwave or air dry.  air drying takes 2-3 days to be totally dry, the microwave takes about 5 minutes or the oven at 150 degrees for roughly an hour or until pale gold.
you should cover the decorations in a clear varnish and these come in different ways.  it can be spray or out of a tin, what ever you prefer.

We went to a mums and toddlers group before Christmas and JD loved doing these, they were so easy to make that any child can do them.  The adult cuts out green triangles for the trees and brown rectangles for the log and stick them together, then give the child a glue stick and some mini bun cases and let them go to town, JD did 3 in the space of about 15 minutes, he just couldn't get enough of them. They took pride of place in our front hall.  I was a very proud mummy with these little beauties that my JD gave me.   

Aren't they fun! why not try them and then send me in your kids pictures?

We didn't have a nativity scene, so i printed off some pictures (chosen by JD) and they were painted, laminated and put up in our kitchen.  Next year i will be adding more pictures to it, some camels, sheep more angels - who knows but definitely there will be more to be added to expand.  

There were shepherds abiding in their fields, keeping watch o're their flocks by night 

Three Wise Men with gifts for the baby Jesus

Joesph, Mary and Jesus in his manger. 

And of course there is some baking!!!!! 

I filled my glass jar up to over flowing with sugar cookies that were made to look like reindeer - we had fun going to get some everyday and even left some out for Santa! 

This was our first batch but i promise you the rest were not over cooked - this comes when little fingers decide they want to increase the temperature while playing hide and seek!!!  And of course our version of a ginger bread house (made with sugar cookie dough)  and glittered by the fabulous Jennifer Scullion who is obsessed!! trust me when i say obsessed (please don't murder me Jenni) we even made Star Trek trees for Dale ( my husband) 

These buns I made for a friend of mine so he could have some Christmas buns with a cup of tea on Christmas Day 

One Advent that I forgot to mention was our movie Advent.  Everyday we sat down and watched a children's movie, i tried to get all Christmas movies but that wasn't always the case. 

My favourite ones were when we watched the Snowman 1 + 2 and Polar Express.  Next year I have big plans for The Polar Express.  

I made a 'ticket' that was on the living room door and every day I wrote what movie it was for that day.  So sitting down with either a cup of hot chocolate and a biscuit or some fruit we definitely enjoyed our movie times

Ready for bed after exciting Christmas fun - all to do again the next day.

This was the best thing - Santa Claus called at our door to bring JD an early gift.  He came on the 23rd and JD was so excited when he answered the door.  I think he was in shock for a minute and then he started picking up everything that had Santa on it to show him.  Definitely will do it again this year because he will know even more this year.

On Christmas Eve we went out for a walk just to look at the lights and massive Christmas tree in the town, when we arrived home JD walked into the living room and there was a big red present in the hearth ... from Santa's elves.

and a letter from Santa (also from the woman who made the invites for the Vintage Tea Party https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Paper-Keepsake-Co/486597608040242?fref=ts) He had a certificate to tell him he was on Santa's good list.  The box was filled with sweets, a cup with hot chocolate powder and marshmallows, crips, new pj's and socks, his bible so he would have the real reason for Christmas in his head as he went to bed, and a cinema ticket (thankfully he had no idea that we had used all his own things - next year will have to be all new things!) 

On Christmas Eve night we had a picnic dinner and watched the new A Christmas Carol animated film with Jim Carrey doing most of the voices. Was a very good movie to watch though maybe JD was a little too young for it., but not next year.

 

In his new jammies :) with mummy and daddy ready for bed and ready for Santa to arrive.  He was so excited he kept creeping out of his bedroom to stand behind the stair gate upstairs to ask if Santa Claus - it didnt help that Dale used kids bells just as JD was going to bed to let him know Santa was on the way (silly man) He did eventually though go to sleep.

our Christmas preparations were so much fun .... let's hope that next year it will be more fun again and I'll have new crafts to do with the fabulous JD !