Advent Adventures - Buddy's Scavenger Hunt

Buddy is our elf. You know, of the Elf on the Shelf variety. As an aside, I am torn on our little Buddy. On one hand, whoever came up with the idea is a freaking genius. I mean Buddy works for behavior manipulation like a dream, BUT it is a little creepy if you think about it. Who wants to be "watched" every moment of every day?

Anyway, Buddy left a scavenger hunt for one of our advent adventures. I picked up these pails and chocolate gold coins at Target for $1 each. Then I wrapped the pails with a note from Buddy telling the boys about the hidden treasure.

The boys had to find all of the "treasure" that Buddy had hidden for them.

The boys LOVED it and it was a pretty cheap activity coming in at $4 in all. If you want to know more about our advent adventures, check out the post here.

Advent Adventures: Make a Gift for Someone Else

I want my kids to understand that Christmas is not all about getting presents and Santa. It is also about giving, and family, and love, and hope, and all those other wonderful things. So, today's adventure is to make a gift for someone else. Knowing how much my kids like dough, I decided to go with salt dough ornaments. I have fond memories of doing this craft as a kid and thought the kids would really enjoy it. 

The recipe:

I mixed and kneaded the dough, then rolled it out and let the kids go to town.

Then we baked them for 2 hours at 250 degrees

Some of them did puff up just a little bit. I simply deflated the air bubbles when they first came out and they stayed down. There is also some cracking on some of the ornaments, but it adds to the charm of the handmade gifts I think.

When they were done, and cooled, we started painting. I had the kids use poster paints because I knew they would clean easily but be a little thicker than water colors.

When the paint was dry I sprayed both sides of the ornaments with clear spray paint to seal them. Then we strung ribbon through the holes so they could be hung on Christmas trees. 

Now we just have to wrap them up for Nana and Papa, Grandpa and Nana Jojo, Grandma, the dog and her friends, and everyone else who will be lucky enough to have these handmade gifts grace their tree.

To read more about advent adventures, go here. 

Advent Adventures - Decorate a tree

 This one could have gone SO many ways.

Originally I was planning on bringing the boys to Target and letting them pick from the collection of 2' tinsel trees. They come in pink, blue, silver, and gold. They were also going to pick from the lights, mini ornaments, tree skirts, and toppers available for these mini trees. When they had decided what they wanted we were going to go home, decorate the trees, add our own original ornaments, and then put the trees in their rooms as decorations.

Obviously this little rendezvous could have gotten a little expensive and having a mini tree in my two year olds' room may have spelled disaster for his curious little hands. So I put that idea in my back pocket for when the boys get a little older.

I then decided that the kids could pick one of the evergreen trees in our yard and decorate the tree for the birds and animals. I envisioned popcorn and cranberries and bird seed ornaments (you know pine cones with peanut butter, birdseed mixed up into blocks and cut into shapes with cookie cutters, that type of thing).

This idea was nixed because stringing popcorn and cranberries requires a needle and patience which means that I will undoubtedly be doing most of the work. Also, I was afraid that there would be other animals, like deer, that would find their way into our yard and I didn't want to encourage these lovable creatures to eat our new trees.

My third idea was the winner for this year. Christmas trees made out of sugar cones, decorated similar to gingerbread houses. Genius, right? The kids could choose the candy they wanted to use and make their tree completely their own.

Of course, they chose the most expensive candy..oh well.

My 6 year old took these pictures. Please keep that in mind...

First, I put a ring of frosting on a plate to hold the cone in place.

Then I put the frosting around the cone as I rotated the plate.

And here is what it looked like when I was done. Looks like a tree, right? Easy!

Next it was up to the kids to add their touch. Of course, they had to taste test the product before adding it to their trees.

Here they are all finished. Unfortunately, I didn't prepare for the fact that my two year old would have a COMPLETE meltdown when I told him he would have to wait until after dinner to eat his tree. (Yes, I let them eat one tree...don't judge.)

Of course, Ben wasn't sure how to actually eat his tree, so he decided the no hands method was the best option.

Next year, I will do this one with gingerbread houses (made out of graham crackers to make it easier) so that the decorating will last a little longer. 

I would also LOVE to try one of the other decorate a tree ideas. Maybe one year will make the difference in what the boys can handle on this one. Have you had any food decorating adventures in your house yet this year?

Advent Adventures Day 1: Let's Find a Tree and Cut It Down

Today began our advent adventures, my new plan to give "experiences" in the advent calendar instead of candy or trinkets. You can read all about it here.

Day one involved hunting for the perfect Christmas tree. In the past, the hunt for our tree has taken hours and involved frozen fingers and toes, piggy back rides, and even some tears. I'm not sure if the stress of getting out of the house with two boys screaming at each other, one baby screaming in his car seat, and me, screaming calmly suggesting that maybe today wasn't the right day to go, allowed us to lower our expectations for the trip or not, but this was the shortest hunt ever. It seriously took us about 10 minutes to find THE tree - and it takes at least five to get us out of the car and into the tree farm.

Since it was the shortest expedition in my tree hunting history, I wasn't able to get as many pictures of the adventure as I would have liked. But I did snap a few.

Pointing out all the possibilities

Finding a good option. He always falls in love with the saddest trees.

Inspecting the sawing progress

The hubs had lots of help

....and we're done! 

It was nice to get the boys outside to run around and all in all, once we got out there, it was a quick and easy advent adventure. Of course, I can't get a tree and not set it all up so here she is in all her glory.

Ah....the holidays are here.