Last year, I started a tradition with the kiddos as a way to count down to Christmas. I loved our advent calendar as a child. Each night my siblings and I got to split a little bag of candy: usually gumdrops and mints that we took off the calendar. I wanted to do something similar with my own kids (minus the candy).
Elf on the Shelf just wasn’t for us; so when a photographer friend of mine invited me to join a facebook group with other photog moms called 25 days of Christmas, I was thrilled. I am not crafty; but thanks to Pinterest, late night trips to Joann Etc, and the dollar section of Target, I can pretend like I am for 25 days. Here is week 1.
Day 1: Sugar cones, covered in frosting, gummy animals and skittles (the kids favorite candy). all iphone pics
Day 2: A trip to build-a-bear. I thought we could make reindeer, but Leo saw the TMNT (he chose Michelangelo not Leonardo, by the way), and I wasn’t about to say no. silly mommy forget her big camera, so again all iphone pics. 🙂
Day 3: While my little guy was napping, my daughter worked on a little perler bead set I picked up. She loves horses, so this little Christmas rocking horse kit was perfect.
And after his nap, he joined us in decorating reindeer antlers.
Day 4: We painted Christmas ornaments that we will give to family members at our Christmas celebrations. My daughter had a great time picking out who would get which ornament and which ones needed the most glitter paint. My son had no interest in painting. 😉
Day 5: At bedtime I hid new Christmas books under their pillows. They loved reading their new books.
Day 6:
Make Christmas cookies. Mmm… maybe that is why we all have a cold now?
Day 7: We went to one of our favorite restaurants for dinner, then took a drive through the neighborhoods to admire their Christmas light displays.
NO picture for this. I decided to just be in the moment. 🙂