We made salt dough ornaments tonight to paint and hang on the tree. I was talking with my friend who recently moved and she was saying how most of their ornaments were packed away at the house for sale here in Arkansas and I was telling her that she and her son could make salt dough ornaments. I rememer making these as a child myself and enjoying the process just as much as the finished product... plus you get a keepsake or two (or 15, ha!) out of it. The dough mixes up in literally a matter of a very few minutes and Noah was able to roll it out and cut out the shapes he wanted with cookie cutters. It was cute because as he was cutting them out he was telling me that he wanted to send specific ornaments to certain people. I thought that was cute that he was thinking of others as he was working at it. After baking for an hour the kids went at them with acrylic paint and I put a coat of acrylic varnish on to seal them when they were dry. Rachel made a blue and purple star, a blue and purple santa claus and an all white snowman (I added his tiny grin for her) and Noah made all kinds of different ones - a purple music note and reindeer, a yellow star, a green tree, my favorite - a red and white candy cane and several more.
These ornaments literally take minutes to mix up and 45 minutes to an hour to bake. You can paint them or let the kids color them with markers. We have several that didn't get painted that Noah wants to color tomorrow. For those of you that may be interested in making them with your little ones --
... and all through the house... the kids danced like monkeys with cookies in their mouths! ;) Tradition - the kids get a plateful of 'Santa' cookies on Christmas Eve at our house. There are lots of traditions we like to take part in at Christmas time and we have done this one every year since Noah's very first Christmas. Had to stick a couple of photos of Phoebe in there to... she's such a sweetie. The kids also tracked Santa with Doug earlier this evening on NORAD and when we checked, he was in Italy. Tonight we snuggled in for Dr. Suess's "How the Grinch Stole Christmas", read The Christmas Story and a few other Christmas books and got the kiddies tucked into bed. Looking forward to seeing the kids reaction in the morning... Merry Christmas!
The kids decorated a gingerbread house tonight. Noah helped me decorate a gingerbread train last year and loved it. He remembers that and has been asking me to do a gingerbread house or Christmas tree this year so tonight was the night. I did the icing and the kids did the rest. I was amazed at how intricate Noah was trying to be (he kept telling me when I did something that wasn't like the picture on the box - please don't let him be obsessive/compulsive like me when it comes to things like that...). Rachel ate waaaaaaaaaaaay more candy than she helped put on the cottage. In fact, she decorated her little christmas tree and gingerbread man really cute and then immediately picked the candy back off of them and ate it! The girl just cracks me up. Noah seemed to have a lot of fun sticking the candy on and stealing bites of icing here and there. He much prefers the icing to all the candy bits.
I couldn't resist snapping this shot of the kids playing puzzles by the tree. Their Grammy and Papa sent them each a new ornament today in the mail (that's exciting stuff you know, getting real mail when you're four and two years old.. ;) They were already just excited about the box, but when they found Star Wars and Princess ornaments inside, they both couldn't wait to put them on the tree. Rachel kept telling us that the pretty Cinderella one was 'MINE' (as in hers) and Noah just thought his was the coolest thing ever. Thanks again Grammy and Papa. They couldn't have been more pleased. =)
