Christmas Picture and Crafts

I'm terrible at taking photos AS I do a project, but this one is the culmination of several. I had a friend embroider the second stocking from the left (Maddie's) ast year, and I think I'm going to do green, gold, and red and get one embroidered for each of us now that I think the family is "complete". My goal is to get a quasi-unified look on all the stockings. Also, there are two homemade ornaments from this year on the tree (which, unfortunately, you can't see really well). Directions for them are below. You're also looking at the entire extent of the Christmas decor in the house...we didn't want to go overboard with small kids!

Ornament project #1:

You'll need a lid from a baby food jar, an ink pad, some colored construction paper, glue, and ribbon. Get a thumbprint of your child (baby's first Christmas is fun, but any age will work) on the paper. Around the thumbprint, write the child's name and the year. Cut a circle from the paper the same size as the inside of the baby food jar around the thumbprint and writing, then glue it inside the lid. Wrap ribbon around the edge of the jar, secure with a little glue, and hang on the tree. I have one of these from when I was a baby, and I thought it was really fun to make them with my kids too.

 Ornament project #2:

 You'll need pasta with holes (penne, macaroni, wagon wheels, etc.), food coloring, yarn, tape, and an oven. Put DRY pasta into a bowl with a few drops of food coloring; for about 1/5 of a box, I used about 8-10 drops. Stir until the pasta is coated. Repeat for all the colors you want to do. Then put the pasta on a baking sheet in the oven at 350 until the food coloring is set, about 10 minutes. After it cools, wrap tape around one end of a piece of yarn and let your kids string the pasta onto it for garland and/or necklaces (we ended up with both!). Unfortunately, like a popcorn string, trying to make a big enough garland to wrap all the way around the tree wasn't a reality with short attention spans. We made four small garlands and just put them in the FRONT of the tree! As far as the Shutterfly link, this is my favorite photo ordering site, because they ALWAYS have coupons (part of being a domestic goddess is saving $$$!) and ALWAYS give cash back into your Upromise account. I definitely recommend checking it out if you haven't done Christmas cards yet.