I know it’s a bit late in the Christmas season to be posting this in the blog world, but I’m just so pleased with the outcome, I’m gonna do it anyway. This month, I have been crafting up a storm!
With Harry being an extremely pokey guy now, and having a new kitten—oh yeah, I should probably do a post introducing him…he’s not that new anymore)—I knew I didn’t want to put all of my special ornaments from my mom in harm’s way. In fact, I probably won’t want to risk that next year either, as, when Gwendolyn was 2, she broke a very sentimental ornament of mine, and, to be completely frank, I’m still sad about it.
I didn’t want to just have a bare tree, and I really wanted to re-capture the amazing, connected December Gwendolyn and I had together 2 years ago, so I decided we’d make a lot of decorations. The benefit being that: if they’re broken, it’s no biggy; they aren’t sentimental; they won’t break into a million pieces; I won’t need to store them; and we could have the added fun of making them together.
For the tree, we put up a garland, and a handful of the most important ornaments up high, but then we made the others. I have baked half a dozen oranges—and I am completely in love with the result! I tried baking some for a garland a couple of years ago, but they didn’t really work out. This year, however, they did. They add the l o v e l i e s t stained glass effect with the light from the window shining behind them. When it comes time to pack up the Christmas things, I’ll probably save any great looking ones.
We also made cinnamon ornaments for the tree. Gwendolyn loved using the cookie cutters, and they add to that nice homemade feel.
As a completely new experience for me, we strung cranberries to make garlands. It was actually really fun and simple. It takes a little time, but not too too much. I mistakenly got the largest bag of cranberries, and I wanted to use them all, so I ended up with a l o t. In the end, it worked out, because I could put up the garlands in multiple places….as a motif.
I like to keep relatively bare walls for a clean look, but Christmas is the only holiday I enjoy decorating for, and I like to really do it well. For years now, I’ve wanted to hang greenery on embroidery hoops. Since I now have serval hoops (from the kids’ birthday party. That’s another fun post ot look forward to!), I decided this was the year. The only issue was, I grossly overestimated the amount of greenery I’d actually need. Not wanting to let it go to waste, I ended up making m a n y greenery wall hangings. It was a bit pesky, because with cats + a baby, everyone wanted to get involved. But it’s really nice to get a little decor in every space to kind of tie it all together.
Lastly, I f i n a l l y completed the advent Todd made! Last year, he built a Christmas tree wooden frame, and I used a staple gun to attached string, then added some copper fairy lights, and ta-da! Only, I’d just had a baby, and never really got around to doing the actual days part. Oopsie. This year, I finished it. Using some cardboard tiles from a bird matching game we have, I traced the shape I wanted on some lovely birch wrapping paper (I drew my outline on the back side, so no lines would be visible), and again on just plain printer paper.
I knew I wanted a classic gold numbers, but figuring out the right way to do them was a bit of a trick. See, I’m not talented in the art + calligraphy areas, so just making the numbers myself wasn’t an option. At the craft store, I realized that I’d have to spend at least $50 in scrapbook stickers to get enough of the numbers I needed, and that seemed ridiculous. My husband offered to try to draw the numbers, and then I could color them in. But then I found the stencils! It was the perfect route! Initially, I thought I’d use paint, but that was so globby, it didn’t work. Gold sharpie was perfect, though! Then, I glued the pieces together, and used self-laminating sheets (obviously keeping a border so they’d stay stuck together).
Overall, I’m extremely happy with the result. Since what I do for advent varies, I can just draw what the activity or book is on the back with dry-erase marker, and clean it off after. It’s functional, it’s pretty, and I love it.
Though it took some hours to get all of these DIY decorations done, I had a really good time. In fact, I think making orange slices and stringing cranberries may have to become tradition. Plus they’re the perfect thing to do between Thanksgiving and December.
My mom was amazing at making Christmas look and feeling magical, and that’s something I really want to do for my kids. However, as a minimalist, I don’t want it to be tied to specific objects. There are so many things (a specific advent, a certain nativity, a collection of santas, tinsel, lots of decorations) that meant Christmas to me, but I want Christmas to be more about the doing and less about what’s on display around the house. I think by making orange ornaments and cranberry strings a tradition, we’ll always be able to create our Christmas vibe, no matter where we are. And that’s something the kids will be able to take with them as they grow up, too.
Do you make any of your decorations each year? Which ones?
