Tip Tuesday! Great Teacher Gift Idea

All afternoon Molly and I have been crafting, crafting, crafting! I saw this adorable idea to make a snowman gift box out of a chinese food container over at Blue Cricket Design (this is an amazing blog, head over and check it out!). So we got to work and made this one for her Storytime teacher. We lined ours with tissue paper, and filled it with mini candy bars.

Molly is so excited to give it to her teacher, I'm just a little worried that the Storytime Christmas party is going to be canceled in the morning due to the winter storm we are getting right now. But I'm sure we can figure out someone who would like this gift. :)

Nativity Set - Spotlight Sunday!

This week I wanted to show off Molly's amazing Nativity Set! My Grandpa (Molly's Great Grandpa) cut out the pieces in wood, and then my talented Aunt Amy took the time to paint them for my daughter and my niece. I think they are fantastic!

I let Molly set them up on the dresser in her room, she is so excited to have something special of her own for Christmas in her room. She talks about them everyday, and I love how it gives me the opportunity to talk about it with her and tell her about why we celebrate Christmas.

Right now she loves the sheep.

I wish I was talented enough to make these!

She's going to enjoy them forever!

Now I am just in need of finding a really good book about The Christmas Story to read to a two year old. We have read a few from the library, but nothing like I had hoped. If anyone has any suggestions let me know.

And thanks again for the hard work and great Nativity Set Grandpa and Amy, we LOVE it.

Blog Makeover!!!

As you can see, my blog is looking quite a bit different! I am so excited, I WON A PRE-MADE LAYOUT from one of my favorite sites, Leelou Blogs. Yes, I knew some Twilight Trivia about Chinchilla poop because I am just that cool, and won! :)

I am in love with the new header. And now I am realizing that my pictures and info need some serious updating. I also have switched to 3 columns. I hope everyone likes it, and just bear with me as I get everything arranged.

Seriously, if you haven't been to Leelou Blogs, head over and check it out. They have lots of free backgrounds to choose, as well as awesome pre-made layouts, custom layouts, invitations, and SO much more. The next thing on my list, a signature. :)

Frugal Friday - Free Christmas Music!

For the 25 days of December through Christmas, Amazon is giving away a new FREE Christmas MP3 download. I am really enjoying my Casting Crowns, Joy To The World.

Head over and check out what songs you can get for free. Happy Frugal Friday!!!

stART - Silver Bells

This Thursday for our stART project, I choose one of Molly's favorite library books from the week. She is very into books that are also songs right now, so she loved reading Silver Bells. The pictures are fun and she loved singing along.
For the craft project, we made bow wreaths. Almost ever picture in the book there is a wreath, so I thought it would be fun to make a few to decorate the house.

All I did was cut the center out of a paper plate, and then let Molly stick Christmas bows all the way around it.
For the finished wreaths, I just added a piece of magnet to the back so that we could hang them on the fridge.
For more great stART books and stories, head over to A Mommy's Adventures.

Wordless Wednesday!

Molly's exact words... "Take my picture mommy, I'm a pirate, arrr..."

For more great "Wordless Wednesday" pictures, (or almost wordless in my case) visit 5minutesformom.

Christmas Card Pictures!

I waited until the day before I was going to order my Christmas cards to try and get a good picture. I always think I'm going to do it way ahead, but for some reason I never do...

Here are the 2009 Christmas card pictures I finally managed to take. I just need to remember that I should never expect my young 2 year old to smile at the camera on command, ah!



And here are a few that didn't make the cut, but I love. I am still figuring out my new camera so it was fun to take 100 pictures and see what turned out... I even did some cropping, scary!

Hee, hee

I think she looks like me in this one.

Getting her feet tickled, I'll try anything for a smile at the camera. :)