Even O Has Noticed...

that I'm a little obsessed with making things out of felt. A couple of nights ago, she was upset because Elliott's handheld mirror is broken. She said "I want mama to fix it. I want mama to make one out of felt!" I adore her :)

Favorite Christmas Books Tradition

I wasn't planning on blogging today, but since O and Ell are sleeping, I figured that I might as well...

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A new tradition that I'm starting this year is choosing O's favorite 4 or 5 Christmas books each year and writing a few sentences in each book telling about her reaction to the book, things that she said and asked about it, etc. I think it will be fun to look back each year and remember what her favorite books were in the previous years :)

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O LOVES this gingerbread house in the Cookie Count book! This book is really amazing :)

She Loves Everything!

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We gave O her handmade cradle, doll quilt, and doll diaper bag filled with lots of goodies tonight (Christmas Eve) after we ate supper and watched home videos. She LOVED it all! I'm so excited :) I was secretly afraid that she should wouldn't be interested in everything, and I'm so glad that my fears were unfounded.

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Elliott gave O this super cool wooden camera for Christmas. Maybe my camera will be safe now :)

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Merry Christmas!

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Peppermint Sugar Scrub

If you need a last minute gift, here is one that you can make in a minute, and you probably have the ingredients in your pantry :) To make the sugar scrub you need sugar, olive oil, and peppermint extract (essential oil would be MUCH better, but I could only find peppermint extract).
Mix a cup of sugar with a half cup of olive oil. We then added about another 1/4 cup of sugar because it seemed too oily. Add peppermint extract (I didn't measure it. I just poured it in until it smelled good :) It was probably about 1 or 2 teaspoons of extract). Unfortunately, peppermint extract has a lot of alcohol in it, so the sugar scrub smells of alcohol as much as it smells like peppermint :) Oh, well. It's the thought that counts, and even though this was easy to make, I put A LOT of thought into it :)

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We put the sugar scrub in a pretty little glass jar.

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Then I put the jar along with a sachet in this felt gift bag (from the dollar section at Target). So now the last handmade gifts are finished! Just in time :) Phew!!!

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The Progressive Apron

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O and I painted these aprons when we painted the kitchen towels. Again she really liked making the handprint tree, but she was not interested in decorating the tree :) My plan for the aprons (each grandma gets one, we made one for me, and one for O) is to add another handprint decoration each year. I will write O's name and the year by each one. O and M (my niece) are both decorating my mom's apron. The aprons came from Hobby Lobby.

Christmas Sachets

O and I had so much fun making these sachets for our family and friends on Monday morning. The idea for these sachets came from here. Thanks, Theresa!

I traced around a salad plate and cut out 8 circles of fabric.

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O enjoyed trying to cut Rosemary for the sachets. This was difficult for her, but she got better at it as she kept trying.

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Putting the Rosemary on the fabric circle

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Putting dried orange peels on the fabric circles. O's favorite part of this project was cutting the ribbon. She was so excited to be able to easily achieve cutting success! (we need to do more cutting activities!)

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And they're done...8 small, sweet smelling handmade gifts! O was VERY proud!

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"Hand" Painted Kitchen Towels

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These towels are another of our handmade (well...handpainted, since I bought the towels) gifts. O enjoyed making the handprint, but she wasn't interested in decorating the tree. After weeks of trying to get her interested in decorating the tree, I finally did it myself :) I hope our family and friends like these special keepsake Christmas kitchen towels :)

Making Peppermint Playdough & Chocolate Letters

We decided to make peppermint playdough and chocolate letters for Sunday night's advent activities. We had a great time making the playdough, and it turned out perfectly.

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We added glitter to make it festive :)

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To make the chocolate letters, O and I put chocolate chips in the silicone alphabet ice trays. We chose letters of our family members' names, and we planned to share the letters with them.

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This project did not work as planned, and it was actually a disaster! I put the trays in the oven to melt the chocolate chips, but they never melted. Then they started burning! Our whole house was filled with smoke, and we had to turn on the fans and open the doors (and it was cold!). Oh, well. I should have followed Amy's instructions and melted the chocolate before pouring it in the trays :)

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More Advent Activities

I've gotten a little slack about blogging our daily advent activities, and I want to remember them for next year, so here they are:
Making a snow globe. Note to self: DON'T use hot glue. It doesn't work!

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Baking with Guh-guh

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More baking with Guh-guh

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Delivering the baked goods to our neighbors was the special activity for one day also. We also had a movie night and attended a couple of Christmas parties.
An unexpected highlight of one of the Christmas parties was a ride on this horse drawn buggy :)

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Doing all of these special activities has made this month so special and so much fun! I can't wait until next year :)