Day 22: Christmas Coloring Pages
The original plan for Day 22 was to drive around and look at Christmas lights and decorations in our town... but... it was a really rainy, foggy, cruddy day. Like, the kind in the Rudolph, The Red-Nosed Reindeer song. We didn't feel like venturing out, so I pulled these coloring pages out of my "back-up plans in case of uncooperative weather" folder and we "helped" Ry color (meaning we colored and Ry scribbled and we all had a good time).
If you're interested in getting a copy of these pages for the little ones in your life, you can download them here.
Day 23: Deliver Treats to Neighbors
A few weeks ago, our church ladies' group put together some cookie in a jar mixes and we were each able to take one home. Since we're gluten free, I decided to pass on my cookie mix to one of our neighbors who loves to bake.
For the other neighbors and our Pastor, I made a batch of Spicy Peanuts. (I used Elana's Spiced Pecans recipe, but made a few substitutions. Instead of pecans, I used peanuts and instead of chili powder, I used smoked paprika. I heard the final result was good, but can't vouch for that personally. In the past, I have made the Spiced Pecans just like the original recipe and can say they were good, so hopefully my subs didn't ruin the amazing original.)
Then, we packaged the nuts in cute Christmas themed treat bags, added ingredient tags and popped them into gift bags. (I find that small gift bags work well when I'm delivering treats. If the person isn't home, you can hang the bag on their doorknob.)
Day 24: Christmas Eve Service & T-Shirt Tradition
The Christmas Eve Service at church went well. I'm singing in the choir this year (and also did a solo) so I was a little nervous, but it turned out well.
Funny story: M was holding Ry during the music portion of the service and apparently, he liked the music so much he decided to "sing" along. When the choir finished holding our crazy 16-beat final triumphant note and cut, I could still hear Ry "singing" loudly for another second or two. He's making a joyful noise, right? Thankfully, those around him just thought it was cute, had a few laughs, and didn't mind the extra input.
For this year's T-Shirt Tradition, the theme was Star Wars. [For those of you who are new around here, it's our family tradition to buy or make t-shirts for our family in a different theme each year. We wear them on Christmas morning while opening our gifts and relaxing.]
I bought Ry's shirt on sale at Target for a few dollars. It's baby Darth Vader and says "Together we can rule the galaxy". Too cute to pass up. For the adult shirts, I looked up pumpkin carving stencils online and printed out a Rebel Alliance insignia and a Darth Vader head shot onto freezer paper, then cut out the shapes with an X-acto knife to make a stencil.
Easy peasy to iron the freezer paper to the shirts and paint. (Note, remember to iron down the stencil firmly so your paint doesn't bleed - I had a small problem with that. Also, remember to put something thick in between the layers of shirt so the paint doesn't soak through to the back.) I used regular old acrylic paint, but you could certainly use a fabric paint.
I googled "free star wars font" and found one I liked. Then I just made myself a freezer paper stencil that said "Rebel" for my shirt and "I am your father" for M's shirt.
M's shirt I did a little differently. I wanted a bleached splatter effect, but didn't have bleach, so I used a combination of watered down white acrylic paint (splattered and sponged around the stencil to make sure there was enough contrast) and sprayed some RIT color remover over the rest for that bleached out look. I think it came out all right, but I think next time, I'd skip the color remover altogether (The effect was too yellow) and just do the paint splatter/sponge. Oh well, makes a good pajama shirt.
Day 25: Merry Christmas!
Hope you all had a fantastic Christmas. We did. It was busy and the weather was totally uncooperative, but all in all, we enjoyed the season and Ry is very sad that the tree and decorations had to go 'bye-bye' until next year. See you in 2016!
Read all the related posts here:
Go you with the solo; I wish I could have heard Ry singing with y'all. Love ya!
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