Salt Dough Gingerbread Ornaments

I saw these salt dough snowflake ornaments from Lorajean's Magazine and fell in love! Not having any glitter or a snowflake cookie cutter and not wanting to purchase anything for this project, I decided to make stars and gingerbread men instead.

 

I used her recipe found here. She adds food coloring and spices to the dough to make it look like real cookies. Genius...if you ask me. I love them!

They are so sweet, I could almost eat them.

Whoops...I guess I already did!


Ha ha. ;) So I am kidding of course. I took a straw and took "bite" marks out of his head. Kind of like this felt version from Anna from Noodlehead.


This would be a fun one to do with kids. I tried making these with mine but one quit after making just one ornament and the other quit when his hands got too messy helping to make the dough. Sigh. I had fun though!

Merry Christmas!

I just wanted to wish you all Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

We have been busy getting a sugar rush... :)

{on a side note...I know my gingerbread looks terrible. I used a new recipe and really should not have.}

spending time with dear friends, and drawing closer as a family.

As our youngest placed the new star on our tree as a sign of Jesus' birth, my heart was filled with gratitude for the birth of our sweet Savior. 

I hope all of you are uplifted and edified by the joy of this season of celebration. 

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Just a little note...

To my husband. Happy 8th Anniversary!

I love you!

 It's also my 27th birthday too...yeah...we were kids when we got married. Or at least I was. :)

*B&W Picture credit: Alyssa Harper, 2009.

**Wedding photo....I don't remember the name of the photographer...wow 8 years will do that to you. Sorry. I guess we own rights to the photos by now. :)

Christmas Cookies

I don't care what you all say...or what my husband says :)...country Christmas music is the best. I am not an avid country music fan, although I like it, but country Christmas music...sigh...sentimental, corny, funny, cheery. The best!

You know that George Strait song, "Christmas Cookies" ?...totally cheesy I know. But when I am making Christmas sugar cookies it sure is hard not to sing that silly song.

 I sure do like those Christmas cookies...sugar.

mmm...mmmm...

 I sure do like those Christmas cookies...babe.

 The ones like look like Santa Claus...

 Christmas trees and bells and stars.

  I sure do like those Christmas cookies babe.

 ...sometimes she'll wait till I'm asleep. She'll take the ones I didn't eat.

 And put those little sprinkly things on top.

 Now those sprinkly things just makes things worse

 Cause it makes them taste better than they did at first

 And they're absolutely impossible to resist. 

Ha ha...love that song. :)

 My kids "helped" decorate which means that they really just frosted a few and promptly ate them. :) Once my 2 year old figured out that you had to eat the broken ones. He would get a new one out and immediately announce, "Op. Broken Mommy!" and then eat it.

Here is one my 5 year old was able to frost and not eat...although he licked his fingers like a million times so I still can't give it away. Oh well...more for us.

I hope you all are enjoying the season, baking, shopping, and spending time with family and friends!

We wish you a very Merry Christmas!

 

Neighbor Christmas Gifts

We just sent our neighbor gifts out before we left for vacation.

Nothing too fancy. Hot cocoa mixes, cookies, nuts and chocolate. I used mostly bags and clear plates, but I saved some old jars too. Once I filled them up I just put an oversized muffin paper on top and tied it with jute.

Simple, simple.

I made these nuts from A Lemon Squeezy Home. Delish! Soooo good and easy to make.

You use egg whites for Christie's recipe so I took the leftover yolks and made some simple chocolate chip cookies. My recipe calls for just yolks with other whole eggs so it was perfect.

Then I made a really easy hot cocoa mix. I got the recipe online a long time ago but the credit goes to Leslie Sausage. Sorry...don't have a link.

Hot Cocoa Mix

10 c. dry milk powder

4 3/4 c. confectioner's sugar

1 3/4 c. unsweetened cocoa powder

1 3/4 c. powdered non-dairy creamer

Mix it all together. Makes about 15 cups of mix or enough for 45 servings.

To make the hot cocoa combine 1/3 c. mix with 3/4 c. boiling water. Stir. 

Easy! I love this as a neighbor gift since they don't feel like they have to consume it right away.

One of my friends is snowman obsessed so I turned hers into a snowman.

The top hat is made out of the already black jar lid and some craft foam and hot glue.

I also tried my hand at some homemade Almond Joys. I think chocolate and candy making is challenge for me...to say the least. They turned out ugly but still really yummy.

The delicious recipe is found here.

Happy baking and neighbor gift making!

Teacher Christmas Gifts

I saw these teacher gift santizer bottles at the Idea Room and thought it would be perfect for my son's Kindergarten teacher and aid.

I wanted to make the transparency insert more like subway art so I made up this template.

Feel free to use it if you like. It just might be a little more complicated than the free download Amy provides for you.

You have to save the image to your computer and then add the name above the dotted line in picasa or photoshop. Save the image and then insert as a picture in a Word document. Print on transparency paper. If you don't want to buy a whole pack of transparencies you can print them at a print shop for a small fee. I was able to print mine for 40 cents and I still could have used more transparency space. Not bad.

You may be able to add it to Word and then add the name but I haven't tried that.

We added some peppermint bark bars and we were all set.

Happy Holidays!

Distressed Canvas Gifts

I have been making some distressed canvases for Christmas gifts. I can't show any of them to you though because I wrapped them already! Dang. It's probably for the better since the recipients likely will read this post.

I can show you these ones though. I decided to make them for our bathroom while I was making the other ones so you can get an idea of what they look like.

They make great gifts for family and they look kind of expensive even though they aren't!

The tutorial is on my blog here.

And here are some extra tips:

*Michael's has 10 packs of 8x10 canvases for $20. If you use your coupon then it comes to under $13 after tax! So...about $1.30 per canvas. Not bad. Go get some soon though because as far as I understand the large packs are seasonal. They sometimes are in stock in the Spring and I have always seen them around Christmas time.They also have large packs of the larger canvases that are a great deal.

*Bonus...for the 8 x10 canvases I only had to make copies on regular sized paper so the prints came to about 12 cents each for black and white. They would have been 6 cents but I requested that they print it in picture quality on their color printer. Ask your print shop if they are able to do the same.  It really makes a difference.

*You can copy and enlarge an existing picture but printing from a digital file will give you better results. Call your print shop before hand to see what type of disk or digital storage device they accept. 

*To make things easier, you may want to size the picture to an 8x10 before taking it to the printer. The print shop can most likely do it for you but it may cost you extra.


This is a fairly fast project and even your kids can help.  

Just make sure to read all the instructions. Everything is very specific, from the type of gel medium you use, to the kind of paper you use. I answer a lot of emails asking questions that have been answered in the tutorial. I don't mind doing that one bit but it might save you some time and grief if you read carefully.  I also get emails from people who missed important instructions and messed up their canvas. Even still... I can help you salvage it.

I hope you are all having a happy holiday season!

Christmas Pizza

 

The thing I love about pizza is that you can make it look however you want!

I normally make pizzas for our Friday family pizza and a movie night. It only took me a couple extra minutes to shape the pizzas like this instead of in a rectangle.

It made me as happy or maybe happier than the kids. :) 

We don't use tomato sauce. We either use ranch dressing or a white sauce.

"White sauce?" you say? It is really simple. Here is a quick how to:


-Make a roux: Add equal parts melted butter and flour {I don't measure, I just eye ball it so a few TBSP of each should do fine}.
-Cook in small sauce pan over medium heat.
-Whisk together and add about 1 to 1 1/2 c. of whipping cream. Whisk until smooth.
-Add chopped garlic. I like to use the pre-chopped jarred kind, to make it even easier, with some garlic powder - we really like garlic.
 -Add a pinch of salt to taste.
-Cook and stir until it thickens. Take off heat and it's ready.

See? Way easy. Definitely easier than a homemade pizza sauce. It isn't as healthy but it is dang good.

Linked up:

First Gift of Christmas

This is a re-post of my guest post on Cheri's blog.

So here goes...

She is such a wonderfully talented person. Did you know that this girl can sing? Like really sing? Has cds out? Yeah. I don't have to tell you how crafty she is either. But...She is also sincere and kind. When she contacted me about focusing on Christ this Christmas I grew to respect her even more.

It is so hard not to get caught up in the excitement of Santa and reindeer, and seeing our kids' faces on Christmas morning when they see the toys they have been dreaming of all year. I think that is a good thing.

But, I think it is a better thing to balance all of that out with the real reason we celebrate Christmas. To help our kids learn that even getting gifts is actually a symbol of Christ. His birth, life, and most importantly Atonement is the greatest gift that has ever been and will yet be given. 

To help us remember this, we started the First Gift of Christmas tradition last year. Our box was not as pretty as this one because we decided to do it the night before, but this year I made a simple white paper-mache box with a red bow to last us through the years.

Inside there are envelopes with the year written in the corner.

 And inside those envelopes are slips of paper where we write down our gifts. 

Our gifts are things we will do for the Savior. For my children, I tell them it is gift we give baby Jesus. Something you will do that He would do or would want you to do. 
 
We tuck the gifts away in the envelope and read ones from years past. I am really excited to read what we wrote last year. I really really wanted to peek but I was good. Promise. :)


Reading past gifts can help us bond as a family as we draw closer to the Savior together.

*This is one of our nativity sets with our porcelain family figurines set around Baby Jesus. This another little tradition we have to help us remember Christ.

Of course this is just how we have chosen to do it but...This is all done at the top of our stairs before we go down to see the tree. No one is allowed downstairs when they wake up. We meet at the top where our First Gift box is placed. We sing a Christmas hymn, say a prayer, give our "gifts" to Jesus and after all that is done, we then go downstairs and still have the giddy Christmas gifting fun around the tree.

My kids were still hyper and super excited last year...and I'll admit so were we...but the morning was cast with a warmer, more loving, more thankful feeling.

It is a simple thing to pause and remember Christ first, but really makes the holiday mean more and can make a lasting impression on our children.

Thank you Cheri for letting me stop by!

Merry Christmas!