And The Christmas Crafts...

      Our Littles are very giving little people- they do have a lengthy list of Christmas Wishes- but when you get right  down to it they want to give to others as much as they want to receive. I love this about them- among other things of course! Needless to say their Holiday gift giving list seems to include everyone this year- even the mail woman can be expecting rice crispy treats one day next week. Not wanting to stand in the way of their Holiday spirit but not wanting to spend a tonne of money I assessed what we had on hand in the studio that would make some sweet gifts to give to our friends.

       I happened to all ready have a few pieces of 100% wool felt- purchased at The Clothe Shop for about $1.50 each- while 100% wool felt is approximately triple the cost of it's polyester cousin for this first project you only need one sheet for two trees. The Littles love to dip their hands into the button jar- pulling out what can only seem like treasure- if you don't have a button jar a quick trip to most second hand store will yield a plethora of vintage buttons! With a few dabs of Nori paste, a couple of pom poms and some doilies we were set to go!

      This first project is perfect for the 2-4 year old in your life- pre-cut the tree out of felt using sharp scissors- have a bowl or cup of buttons, pom poms and fabric scraps all ready to go. I like using Nori paste which is a non- toxic seaweed based paste- it is a bit gummier than white glue so the buttons and beads stay put.

    Let your little one go to town decorating this diminutive tannenbaum while you sit back and sip your latte or perhaps set up the next project which is a tad more involved. Once maximum decoration saturation has occurred set the tree aside until the paste has fully set up- ours took over night to dry thanks to some very enthusiastic gluing! Once dry you can add a string for hanging- this would be really cute in place of a "Pine" scented air freshener hanging off a rear view mirror!

       Frosty the Snowman is huge around here right now- not only the animated classic but the song as well- I think The Boy is learning it for his Holiday Pageant at school- at any rate lets just say it is a highly requested number around here. Using this as inspiration we made our own Frosty the Snowman out of doilies- I mean naturally what else are doilies for!

      For this  second project you will need three doilies, a strip of white paper, a felt hat- cut out by a parent or other responsible adult who can use a pair of scissors, mini pom -poms, three buttons and of course a pipe cleaner.

      Using the white strip of paper glue down the three doilies- slightly overlapping them to give the appearance of well a snowman. From there it simply comes down to accessorizing your snowman- happy- sad- cranky- two eyes or one- it is up to the artist!

     Finish off your Frosty with a jaunty pipe cleaner scarf twisted around it's neck- set the entire thing aside to dry- once again we used a tad too much glue. There was some discrepancy between the actual song and what a snowman really looks like- some people say Frosty has a "corn cob nose" and some say it is a carrot- so whatever works for you- we do not discriminate around here! These look great taped to the window- letting the light come through the cut out bits of the paper doily.

     Of course no Crafternoon is complete with out some sort of delicious beverage- for Momma that might mean coffee with Baileys and for the Littles that surely means a mug of hot chocolate! I love that our Littles are starting to put others first- they can be so thoughtful (when they want!) and I think we came in on budget with these simple, fun and age appropriate projects!

P.S. tomorrow I will be posting the second art project from last weekend's demo at Opus Framing and Art Supplies- lots more glue and tissue paper! Hint hint: Eric Carle is in the house!!!