nutcracker with Bee

I've been waiting until she was old enough to make it all the way through, and this was the year. I took Bee to the Nutcracker for a girls day. We got all dressed up and even put on a little blush. Bee adored it! When I asked what her favorite part was, she said "all of it!" I know she was getting a little bored during the second act when there are the longer dances, but she was great.

After the show, they had a tea party for little girls. The girls got their picture taken with the Sugar Plum Fairy and Cavalier (I still need to scan that one to share) who are in real life a married couple that travels the world dancing together. They had the most delicious cupcakes and gave the girls come crafts to work on there and one to take home. Some others from the ballet came and did photos and autographs. Bee was excited to see Clara (who is called Marie in our book of The Nutcracker)

While the girls were out, the boys took a nap and went to McDonalds. I think we had the better plans! Lou asked when he would be old enough to go to the ballet.

reindeer week

I discovered our reindeer week craft, but can't recall the books. One of them was really cute too.... hmm.

Anyway, here's the craft we did two weeks ago at the nature center. I can't have the kids do paint hand prints because we don't have a sink nearby for easy cleanup. We do a lot of tracing of hands though. This reindeer is a foot print for the head and hands for the antlers. Most of the kids that come to our group are 2 and young 3s so this craft worked for them and also, even if their parents help do a lot of the placement of the pieces, at least it's still their hands (and foot). Grandma's love that.



 
...trying to remember the name of the fiction story I read...

since this is short- here's something cute and funny:

Bee wrote "mom" on a post it note and put it above my bed. I guess she wants to be sure everyone knows that's where mom is to sleep. She also added a heart, which Lou always tells her look like butterflies.

another week at the nature center

I was looking forward to this week at the nature center since I love reading the story The Mitten to a group of little folk. This was the first time since having met Jan Brett last month, so I was even more excited than normal.

I read the story and had the kids place their animal in the mitten when it was their turn (8 animals in the story find their way into a little boys mitten). Lou had passed those out for me when we were first getting started. I printed out the animal faces from Jan Brett's web site. I just copied the masks that she shares there and pasted them in a word doc so that I could make them smaller. The mitten is scrap fleece.

We also sang this song from Mrs. Jone's website and used the animals and mitten again. Mrs. Jones also has lots of other activities for The Mitten, as well as other books.

The Mitten in the Snow Song
Tune: The Farmer in the Dell
This is the order of the animals in Jan Brett's version of the book:
A mole is the first to discover the mitten and crawls inside, followed by
a snowshoe rabbit, a hedgehog, an owl, a badger, a fox, a bear and, finally a mouse.
The mouse causes the bear to sneeze; the mitten and all its occupants go flying.

The mitten in the snow
The mitten in the snow
Help us please so we won't freeze!
The mitten in the snow.

A mole squeezes in
A mole squeezes in
Help us please so we won't freeze!
The mitten in the snow.

A rabbit squeezes in
A rabbit squeezes in
Help us please so we won't freeze!
The mitten in the snow.

A hedgehog squeezes in
A hedgehog squeezes in
Help us please so we won't freeze!
The mitten in the snow.

An owl squeezes in
An owl squeezes in
Help us please so we won't freeze!
The mitten in the snow.

A badger squeezes in
A badger squeezes in
Help us please so we won't freeze!
The mitten in the snow.

A fox squeezes in
A fox squeezes in
Help us please so we won't freeze!
The mitten in the snow.

A bear squeezes in
A bear squeezes in
Help us please so we won't freeze!
The mitten in the snow.

A mouse squeezes in
A mouse squeezes in
Help us please so we won't freeze!
The mitten in the snow.

"A-choo"
The bear says, "A-choo!"
The bear says, "A-choo!"
All the animals fly out of
The mitten in the snow!

For our craft, we made a gift for the winter animals. The kids covered pine cones in shortening and rolled them in bird seeds. We didn't use peanut butter in case of allergies.

We hung all five of ours up and are awaiting our feathers friends discovery of these tasty treats.

(edited to add: actually, right after we hung them up, we watched as three naughty squirrels chewed through the yarn and ran off with the pine cones.)

I have been keeping an eye on these little birdies in the gift shop at the nature center. They were all alone and didn't have a price. The volunteers that normally work the front desk never know how much they cost and the right person is never there to declare a price. Anyway, this week, there were a bunch of people out sick and the director happened to be at the front desk. I asked her and she said, "how about 4$?" Really? I paid $4 a piece although I would have paid more. I'll have to throw some extra money in the 'feed the raptors' donation box to make up for my good deal.

It seems that I forgot to share last week's reindeer craft, and I can't even find the pictures right now. If I find them, I'll just post them later.

pretzel wreath

My aunt sent me some pictures of these cute wreaths made from pretzels and white chocolate that she's been making up for many years. They were the perfect project to keep a couple of girls happily entertained for an hour or so and a fun gift that Bee passed out at school during her Christmas party.
Each wreath took 12 pretzels. One bag of white chocolate made 12-13 wreaths, depending on how much taste testing you do. Since I was having little people help me, I drew a pattern for them to follow on paper and put it under the plastic wrap. Also since I was working with little people, I put everything they would need out in bowls ready to go. (this photo was taken just before the chocolate was melted)

Bee had a few friends over, so they became my elves and I put them to work.

6 pretzels are dipped in melted white chocolate then laid out in the bottom row, another 6 are dipped and laid on top. A twizzler pull and peel is tied in a bow and added. The girls also sprinkled some Christmas sprinkles on the wreath before it dried.

We just put them in zip lock bags, but here's the picture my aunt sent of her finished wreaths.

I thought they turned out really cute and of course they tasted wonderful! Anything dipped in chocolate is yummy though.

mostly for the grandparents- Bee's christmas program

Sorry, this post will interest only a few. It's mostly for the grandparents... and my sister and aunts, and the other family members I have guilted into reading my blog everyday. But, If you think little people singing are cute though, there's a video at the end!

Bee had her Christmas performance at preschool this week. Her favorite part was singing on stage. This picture shows her new shoes. I wanted her to wear her black shoes, but she said these make her feel like a queen. I'm not going to get in the way about a girl feeling good in her shoes. Do all queens wear 2$ shoes from the thrift store? (They were brand new silver ballet slipper style shoes and fit her perfectly- I couldn't believe it!)


The kiddos sang us 4 or so songs and signed with them. Bee watched her teachers the whole time and just copied their motions. This was funny for us since we used to do a lot of signing at our house. Most of that died out when Lou started talking though. I should write about signing with little bitty ones some time. I have the cutest video of Bee doing a bunch of signs at about 10 months.
They were so cute and did a nice job. I know that they did a lot of practicing during school, especially since it's been too cold to play on the playground.

Lou was certain that he should get to sing on stage too. Daddy took him up after the show and let him test it out.

Treats in the room were next. Bee got to sit next to her good buddy and we even found a chair for Lou to squeeze in too.

The kids were given the cutest little banks. I have never sent these in the unpainted wood project section of the craft stores, but maybe they are from a mail order place. That probably is the case since they probably made 100 of them. I think they are cute and would make a good class project in the future.

That's a favorite bible verse at our house. I am saying it to the kids so frequently that I've heard Bee say it to Lou when she wants something that he has.

Here's a side view. I suspect that modge podge or something else similar was used to attach the paper to the box.

Bee gave her friends chocolate pretzel wreaths that I'll be sharing here tomorrow.
Here's the promised video:

odds and ends

Using this tutorial, I have been making some (EASIER) zipper pouches. They aren't lined, but I like them just as much. I have a new one that I take to the gym that is just the right size for my ipod, phone, chapstick, hair band and gym pass. It can hang on the machine while I work out and I still have all my things right there instead of in a locker. We recently joined a gym and I am so happy that we did. I am so enjoying 5am by myself! I have fully recovered from an extremely embarrassing first attempt at their cycling class. (we still have peanuts left!)

I mailed my brown paper package (part of the brown paper package exchange from Max and Ellie). I sent it to Valarie who blogs here. She has not blogged about the package yet, although I am sure she must have received it by now. I included a set of produce bags, a jar of apple butter, an ornament, and a felted wool bag. It was all wrapped up in brown paper. I tied it in string, but the postal worker had me remove most of it.

I saw online somewhere, where someone was sewing cloth gift bags for christmas. I have whipped up several and wrapped up our gifts in them. They are lined with fleece. Opening presents will be a quick event since opening a velcro is much faster than unwrapping presents. Here's the first one, I think they've gotten cuter the more I've made.

Even though we don't tell the kids that Santa comes to our house, we still like to go visit him and pose for a picture. We tell them he's just a symbol of Christmas, like a tree or lights. It's not a big deal, but people get kind of weird when we say that we don't "do" Santa. Our library had an evening story time with Santa and this guy was great! He was so good with the kids and sang songs and said that he would stay as long as it took for pictures and talking. He didn't want anyone to feel rushed. Lou finally was brave enough to sit with him. We sat and watched the other kids and went last. I think that helped Lou feel ok. When he asked Bee what she wanted, she said, "I think my mom and dad already got me presents." They decided that maybe she wants a pony. Thanks old man.

As of this morning, the last of the Christmas orders are shipped! hooray! I still have some projects to finish for our family, but there's time for that. I made tons of aprons this year.

Just one cape! yippee... It went well despite my new dislike for sewing with the satin.

Here's a cute custom puppet curtain. I love the way it turned out. I did a cute one with flowers added on the bottom, but can't for the life of me find the picture.

I also had this custom order for adult canvas aprons to kind of match the kids capes I made previously. The multiple layers of canvas were almost too much for my machine. I should have charged more for all the needles I broke!

Hope your getting to all of your holiday odds and ends too. Tomorrow: Bee had her school Christmas program and it was super cute...

Bee's new purse holder

Look at the before.... oh my!

Some might not be able to look past the 1982 style teddy bear scene on this board. I saw a sturdy rack that just needed a little loven'.

It was hard work, but I used a hammer and attacked the old bears.

I covered a piece of cardboard with a thin piece of batting and then some fabric. This fabric matches her lamp.


Ribbons and buttons were added and then it was secured in the frame. I did white wash the frame before adding the covered board. I liked the pink color, but it was too bright. I am happy with the finished shade. It looks nice next to her bow holder on her wall.



She moved the purses and bags in right away. I moved three pictures from her bulletin board over but she has sense fill it up. (I'm itching to pull the bulletin board down. It's stuck to the wall with double stick tape and might be a mess.) That bag with the bunny is mine from when I was little.

Also added to Bee's room recently are these shutters made into a headboard. My neighbor had them in her garage sale the weekend we moved in and I thought about them for two months before going back to see if she still had them. Sure enough she did and gave them too me. She's a crafter too and couldn't stand the thought of pitching them. She just started an etsy shop and a blog too. She sells bows and the cutest rag bags. I'm hoping I can get her to do a giveaway here soon.

I meant to paint Bee's room before it got too cold to open the windows, but it'll have to wait until spring now.

kid made coasters

Bee had this awful bulletin board on her wall. It was attached by some previous dweller with double stick tape, that thick foamy kind. It was the kind that is just the cork board, no frame. I had hope to remove the pieces of board without tearing them so that they could be reused somewhere else. When I started removing them, they broke in pieces and ripped part of the wall and paint. I plan on painting her room at some point, so that's no biggie. Maybe it will provide motivation.

The board came off in chunks, but some of them were big enough to reuse. I cut them into squares appropriately sized for coaster. The kids painted them with Christmas pictures.

The edges were a little crumbly, so I dipped the edges carefully in some modge podge. That totally seemed to do the trick. I considered sealing the tops too, but that would defeat the purpose of having an absorbent cork coaster.

These were delivered to some dear friends this weekend who I knew would appreciate a handmade gifts from the kids. They have many special little kids in their lives, but they love on our kids like they are the only ones. We all just eat it up.