Make a Reindeer {A cute children's craft}

A very happy two days before Christmas to you all! I hope this finds you doing well! :)

I have a cute little craft to show you for the kids, something to keep them busy while they wait for Christmas Day! This one is ideal for elementary school ages and older. 


 {Clothespin Reindeer} 


What you'll need for each reindeer:


3 "no-roll" clothespins
Two red sequins
Green and red felt
Ribbon to hang ornament
Small wiggly eyes
 *Tacky Glue/Elmer's glue or glue gun/glue sticks

*If they are old enough to use a low temp glue gun, or if an adult can help them, that works better than the Elmer's glue we first tried. My kids and I switched to using the glue gun! But Elmer's glue does work, if you have patience to allow for the extra drying time. I have heard fantastic things about "Tacky Glue", so if you have younger children, that might be the best route!


To make this ornament, first take two of the three clothespins and glue them together.

Then glue one side of the very top of the third clothespin, pressing it onto the other two clothespins you glued together, like this:





Next glue on the wiggly eyes and a red sequin for a nose

Now it's time to cut a piece of felt to glue over the reindeer back...I cut mine into kind of a "band aid" shape, but a rectangle works, too! :)

 

 Then just glue it onto your reindeer like so:

Next up are the reindeer's ears, which are meant to look at little like leaves, and a red sequin between them. See how it looks like holly leaves and berries?

 But what would a reindeer be without a tail?

I just love these pom poms, and we used them for ours. However, these have to be glued on with the glue gun, so if you are using Tacky glue or Elmer's glue, regular pom poms work just great!

 Now just glue your pom pom to the back of the reindeer,and add a ribbon tie to it.

 

 

{I just made a loop of ribbon and tied it together, and glued the tied knot in between the back of his antlers...}

And there you have it! A fun little reindeer ornament your kids can hang on the tree!

Thank you for stopping by and I hope you all have a wonderful day! I am going to be wrapping some gifts and baking more today! How are you spending these last days before Christmas? 

Blessings,

Jenni

Guest Post {Erin from Peony Wire Works}

 Hi dear friends! I hope this last week before Christmas is going well for each of you!

I am excited to have my friend Erin from Peony Wire Works here today to share her tutorial of an amazing ornament she came up with!

Hello All!  I am so happy that Jenni asked me to do another ornament tutorial...she has started a new tradition for me and those I gift at Christmas time(so thank you Jenni!!).  I am so glad to be here today and hope you love this ornament, I know I do.

What you will need:
-Sheet music
-Chip board
-Mod Podge
-Glitter
-Burlap
-Ink pad
-Sponge Applicator
-Fancy scissors(and regular)
-Hot glue gun(have lots of sticks at the ready)
-Stencil for Monogram(I use about and 1 1/2 inch size)
-String

First, pick a round size that you want your ornament to be.  I chose a Dora cup because it is bigger at one end and smaller at the other, and it's what I had on hand.  Next, trace the top of your cup and the bottom of your cup on Chip board.  And trace them again on to the music sheet.  Cut all of those out.

For the smaller circle, Mod Podge the BACK of the sheet music only to the smaller Chipboard circle. No need to use a lot of Mod Podge, just cover the surface. Set that aside and let it dry. For the bigger circle, cut a piece of burlap so that there is about 1/2 overlap.  Mod Podge this to the chipboard(I like old shirt boxes because the burlap and brown of the chipboard are about the same color), and hot glue the edges of the burlap to the back of the chipboard.  Set aside let it dry.

Pick the smaller circle back up and decide how you want it monogrammed.  I like the sheet music facing me like I am reading it and put my stencil on.  Take the sponge applicator and blot it on your ink pad several times.  Then blot the applicator over your stencil(I chose ink over paint for drying and Mod Podge purposes), while holding the stencil and circle down firmly.  After this has dried(I usually wait 10 minutes), apply a light coat of Mod Podge over the entire surface and glitter with translucent glitter.  Yep, set that aside to dry.

Grab your sheet music once more(a whole sheet or half sheet lengthwise).  You want to place your cup (biggest end down)on the paper and measure out about 1/4-1/2 inch.  Then you want to eyeball that size the whole length of the paper.  This will be your fan.  I liked folding my edges and tearing it to size for some, and for others, I cut my edges with my "fancy scissors".  Once you have the page torn lengthwise to your specifications, you are going to fold it like a fan(my folds were approximately 1/4", and I did about 20 folds).

After you have done that, take your folded page and fold it in half one way(making sure the edges meet nicely) and then take it and fold it the other way(again, edges meeting nicely).  Take your hot glue gun and run a bead on half of one sides fold.  Press those together and hold for a few seconds.  Then take the other open fold and run a bead of hot glue on half of the fold again, press and hold.  Voila!  You now have a fanned circle.

Put hot glue all over the back of the burlaped circle and place this on your music sheet fan however you think looks best.

Finally, hot glue all over the back of the glittery monogram circle, and place that on the base of burlap and fan.  Measure out your string for hanging, and glue it in the back of your fan blades.  You now have a nice monogrammed ornament to give to someone special!

Here is a variation that I did, and it turned out to be my favorite...gotta have some Wire in there!

I just want to say thanks again to Jenni for inviting me to share this project with you, I am honored and happy to share.  Merry Christmas to you all!

Erin

Thank you so much for sharing this with us, Erin! It is one of the cutest ornament ideas I've seen! What a fun craft to make for one's own tree, or the perfect gift for a loved one!

Here is a sampling of the amazing wire creations Erin whips up:

 {set of notion jars}

  

 {wire cloche}

 

{The Lovely}

 

 

{Such a darling white cloche!}

And, of course, the basket made from a lampshade she covered with chicken wire:

If you are like me, and you love what she has come up with, you can see more of it here, at Peony Wire Works. You can also find her Etsy shop here. 

And just to give you a heads up, at the beginning of January, I'll be hosting a giveaway of some of Erin's lovely wares. Let me just say, you don't want to miss out on this one! She has made some gorgeous things for this giveaway! :)

So again, a big thanks to Erin for her tutorial, and thank you each for visiting today! 

I will be back tomorrow with a cute children's craft idea, just perfect to keep the kids busy and happy during this time before the big Christmas weekend! 

Have a wonderful Thursday!

Blessings,

Jenni 

The Twelve Days of Christmas Cookies {Day Three}

Hi friends! I hope you are having a fun weekend!

The last weekend before Christmas...Yikes! Where did all the time go?

Now I will admit it seems my brain is running on fumes lately with the craziness of it all, but I can still do basic math. And I know that in order to give 10 more cookie recipes before Christmas, I am obviously going to have to do more than one "day" in a given day! :) I hope you don't mind this!

So, without further ado...

"On the third day of Christmas,

there was a recipe

for

Giant Ginger Cookies"

{see, it even rhymes...sort of}

;)

These are delicious cookies, and they have a "secret" ingredient that gives them a little zip, which is black pepper.

{Ingredients}

2-1/2 cups all-purpose flour

2-1/4 teaspoons baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon ground ginger

1/2 ground allspice

1/4 teaspoon ground pepper (the recipe calls for 1/2 teaspoon, but it was too much for me! However, for full disclosure, my husband liked it best with 1/2.)

1-1/2 sticks (12 tablespoons) unsalted butter, room temperature

1/2 cup packed light-brown sugar

1/2 cup granulated sugar, plus 1/3 cup for coating

6 tablespoons unsulfured molasses

1 large egg

{To bake}

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F, with racks in upper and lower thirds. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper; set aside. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, salt, ginger, allspice, and pepper.

With an electric mixer, beat butter, brown sugar, and 1/2 cup granulated sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in molasses and egg.

With mixer on low, gradually beat in dry ingredients just until combined.

Flatten into a disk, wrap in plastic, and freeze for 20 minutes for easier handling. * I found it took more like 45 minutes until it was easy to handle!

Shape dough into twelve 2- inch balls. Place remaining 1/3 cup granulated sugar in a bowl.

Roll balls in sugar to coat; place on prepared baking sheets, at least 4 inches apart. Flatten into 3-inch rounds; sprinkle evenly with sugar remaining in bowl.

Bake, rotating sheets halfway through, until cookies are set and cracked on top, 12 to 15 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

{Makes 12}

* Now I prefer them a little less large, so I rolled the dough into about 1 inch balls. This way the recipe makes about 2 dozen. But either way, they taste good!

Well, thank you for letting me share another cookie recipe with you! I will be back later today with a craft idea for kids! Have a beautiful day! :)

Until then,

Jenni

Today's Feature: Turley Times

Today we’re featuring Hannah, from Turley Times!  I {Belle} discovered Hannah's blog about a year ago, while reading her mother's blog, Nancy Tidbits, who we featured two days ago.  Hannah and her husband recently, as within the last year, purchased a home and Hannah shares, at her blog, all the joys of home ownership.  What I love about Hannah's blog is that it is well rounded.  Its not just about decorating, but living and enjoying life along the way.  If you've haven't visited Hannah's blog before, be sure to stop by and say hello.  With that said, here is today's featured blogger. In this post, Hannah will be sharing with us a tutorial on how to make Ribbon Stars.   Enjoy!

I learned how to make these ribbon star Christmas ornaments from an issue of Martha Stewart Living last fall.  They are very simple and inexpensive to make - in other words, it's a craft even I can handle!  All you will need is a glue gun and some ribbon.  For this demonstration, I used 3/8" red and white grosgrain ribbon from Michaels.

All you are going to be doing is making six loose, flat knots so that the two ends of your ribbon will come together to form a six-pointed star.  For the star I made in these photos, I cut off about a foot of ribbon from the spool.  The length is going to vary depending on how loose or tight you make your knots and the width of your ribbon (the wider your ribbon, the more you will need to make each star).  Make sure you have enough extra ribbon so that you can tuck the excess into the ends and glue it all together.  It will require a little trial and error on your part.

Start out by making your first flat knot.  Notice how I left a little extra ribbon on the end...that will get trimmed later on, but I'll leave some of it there so I can glue my ends together when I'm finished.

Then, make your second knot directly adjacent to the first knot.  You don't want to leave any space between each knot so that the two ends will come full circle after you've made six knots.  And make sure not to tighten your knots.  They should be pretty loose...you aren't tying shoes here!  :-)

Continue on with your knot making...here I've made three knots.

Four knots...

Five knots...

After the sixth knot, the two ends should be meeting each other quite nicely.  At this point you will snip off the excess ribbon, leaving just enough extra to dab on a bit of hot glue and tuck it underneath your last knot.  This is what a completed star should look like.

Once you've made your first star or two, you'll really start to get the hang of it and will be making tons of them because they are just so pretty and fun!  Here are some of the stars I made last year.

I even dedicated an entire Christmas tree to my ribbon stars.  I used little metal ornament hooks to attach mine to my tree, but you could also just stick a tree branch into the middle of each star and hang them that way.

{All photography courtesy of Hannah}

One piece of wisdom I learned last year that I will pass along to you.  This is probably going to be painfully obvious to most of you, but I didn't realize this at first.  If you are using ribbon that has a design printed on only one side, your stars will show only half of the design because of the way you tie the knots.  I ended up making some ornaments that were half plain, half decorated because I had bought a spool of ribbon with a screenprinted design on it.  It wasn't that big of a deal, but you will probably be better off using solid ribbon or ribbon that has stitching or printing on both sides.

That's it!  These ornaments are a really easy way to add a little "homemade" to your Christmas tree.

Thanks again Hannah for sharing this ornament idea!  To all our readers, thanks for stopping by Beautiful Nest and we hope you all have a wonderful day! 

Today's Guest Blogger: Nancy's Tidbits

Today we’re featuring Nancy, from Nancy's Tidbits!  Nancy will be sharing with us a tutorial on how to make Pinwheel Christmas Tree Ornaments.  If you've visited Nancy's blog you know that she has great ideas when it comes to decorating, and this is one of them!  So without further ado, here is today's feature!

I first saw a pinwheel craft on the blog Made By Stephie. I liked the idea, but wanted a different pattern. So I just googled and found a simple pattern. It's basically a 5.25" square. And the procedure is very easy! First you find some pretty double sided scrapbooking paper you like and cut a square (5.25").

Next, you start cutting from each corner towards the middle, but don't cut completely to the center. You'll be cutting approx. 3.25" from a corner towards the center. Do this on all four corners.

Then you take every other corner and bring the tip towards the center and hot glue it down. I'm terrible at giving instructions, but I'm confident you'll begin to make the pinwheel shape!

After you're done glueing the corners in the middle, glue a vintage button in the center, hot glue a piece of ribbon to hang and you're done!

Thank you so much for sharing your tutorial, Nancy!  We couldn't close this post without sharing some more of Nancy's many creative ideas.  These four captured my {Belle} interest from the moment I saw them.  Fun, classy, simple and elegant you can find them all at Nancy's Tidbits.  Like these quick and easy Christmas tree ornaments, made with vintage sheet music! Or this Fleur de Fun coffee mug, or table makeover and what's not to love about this necklace made from tile pendants?  I sure hope you'll stop by Nancy's and say hello and when you do, be sure to tell her how you discovered her blog.

{All photography courtesy of Nancy}

Thanks for stopping by Beautiful Nest today and we hope to see you visit again soon!