A Homemade Christmas

I love creating things . . . I really do even if they don't turn out perfectly . . . that's part of the charm of homemade stuff. Even if I had lots of money I wouldn't prefer to go out and buy everything pre-done, pre-made . . . there's just something about process that is almost therapeutic, of course, it's hard to make stuff when you're short on time and surrounded by kids who either want to help or don't want to help, I don't know which is worse.

So today I got the teacher gifts almost done. I put candy in these jars and decorated the top with scrapbook paper and tied some ribbon on. Looks cute and the paper can be removed and the jar can be reused or regifted. I'm making ornaments to tie on the jars too . . . haven't started those yet . . . I only have 5 to make before tomorrow morning . . . no sweat, it's 7:30pm, I got time.

Kids and I started working on some neighbor gifts too. I thought it would be nice to give our neighbors some treats since they are all so nice to us. We began with hot cocoa stirrers made of marshmallows, melted chocolate, and candy canes. The kids only wanted to eat marshmallows and they liked smashing the candy canes but it took forever to unwrap candy canes -- do they make them unwrapped? They should. The kids lost interest fast and I had to keep stopping every 3 minutes because someone learned how to climb the stairs

. . . thanks to Daddy. He said "well, we taught the other kids at 1 year to crawl up the stairs" And yes, we did but that was because I didn't want to keep making 3 trips up the stairs to go to bed 3 times a day. The gate wasn't a big deal then. Now I put the gate up and I have 3 kids needing to go up and get this or that and moving that gate more times than I can count. Anyway, this is time consuming getting her off the stairs or putting up the gate.

Tomorrow we're supposed to get a HUGE ice storm . . . so once again I should probably venture out and get some groceries so we're not ALL stranded at home without food . . . since that's all these kids want to do lately but at least maybe we can finish some more of the neighbor gifts . . . I think cookies would be a nice accompaniment to go with their cocoa.

I better get going on those 5 ornaments not to mention all the other gifts I haven't started on yet but can't mention . . . too many eyes reading this blog who might be receiving one of my gifts.