Advent Calendar - Week 2

Here's this week's recap:

Day 4 - Make Christmas Goodies with Mom

I forgot to take a picture of him helping me, but I chose a simple one - Pretzel Hugs.  He did okay, but the only part he really enjoyed was setting the hugs on the pretzels, and once I put them in the oven he disappeared.

Day 5 - Buy a Gift to Give Away

We went and bought our Angel Tree gifts, and today we brought them back to church so they could be delivered.  No picture of that, but here's some colored ice he made with Grandma:

Day 6 - Visit Great-Grandpa DG and Great-Grandpa VV

 

Both Henry and Great-Grandpa were impressed by the three Hubers Lumber hats.

Day 7: Have Grandpa & Grandma H and Grandpa & Grandma VM Over for Supper

This was one of the highlights last year, and this year was no different.  I had Henry make the phone calls to invite them over when we got home at noon (I had arranged the date in advance!), and the calls were short and to the point. :)

 He got to lick out the bowl of whipped cream, which is never disappointing.

And Henry made sure they played down stairs with him after supper.

Day 8: Visit the Nursing Home and Hand out Treats

We had made extra candy cane reindeer and went to pass them out.  Henry did pretty good - only two really wanted us to stay and sit down (which wasn't an option with Henry!).  One guy was pretty interesting, but the last one we stopped by was where we ran into problems.  Henry was ready to go, and I had said this was our last one, but the poor lady was confused and thought we were someone she knew and REALLY wanted Henry to come say hi and sit by her.  Not much I could do about that, though.

Day 9: Make a Snowman Ornament

We actually did this the next day, because Friday we went shopping with Rachel.

This was kind of fun - because I gave up my plan!  I enjoy crafts, but I want them to turn out and therefore have a hard time letting Henry do his own thing.  So instead of making an ornament where I would want them to look "just right," I got out the construction paper and let him paint however he wanted.  He thought it was hilarious that I painted his hand.

Day 10: Make Treats for Friends

We skipped this - we did the snowman painting instead, and we have the candy cane reindeer done.  I had an idea to go with it, but it just wasn't necessary and didn't sound fun at the time.

While we were shopping with Rachel, we drove through Falls Park to look at the lights before heading home.  Henry saw a "raining tree" and we had to park the car so he could get out and look at it closer.  We ended up running all over and he had to touch some lights, and he wanted to roll down a big hill - I was freezing and it was pretty close to the water so I put a nix on that idea.

Advent Calendar, Year 2

I'll never be a dependable blogger - sometimes it just doesn't fit in my life.  So you'll just have to bear with me on the random posts and unannounced breaks.

Henry and I really enjoyed our Advent Calendar and all the activities last year, so I think it will always be one of our traditions.  The activities will change from year to year as I figure out what some favorites are and what isn't that enjoyable.  And while I think something like this would be fun for every family, some of our activities may be "way over the top" for others.  But I have the time and the enjoyment for baking and crafting.

One thing I learned last year was to be flexible.  If Henry wasn't in the mood to do something, trying to convince him it would be fun was never successful.  And that defeats the reason I wanted to do this - to make this a season of fun and serving others so it doesn't become a season wrapped around one day of presents.

On to the calendar.  Here is this year's version:

While I found tons of cute ideas, I needed something simple so that I would actually get it made before December 1.  I had squares of cardstock that I folded over a little to make a pocket in the back, and stuck a piece of paper in it with our activity on it (which makes it easy to switch activities if something unexpected comes up one day).  Then I printed numbers on paper, cut them out and glued them on the fronts of the cards.  Then I taped a piece of twine onto our mantel and used mini clothespins to hang the cards up.  A little effort, but pretty simple (and reusable next year).


Day 1: Put up the Christmas Tree and Decorate:

This went about the same as last year, but I planned for him to have some hot chocolate while I "un-smooshed" the branches (which is where he lost interest last year.  He also decided that he wanted a popcorn string on the tree because of the book, If You Take a Mouse to the Movies. 

It may not have been my best decision, but I agreed and even thought, "Hey, I have a bag of cranberries still setting in the fridge.  And I'm stubborn enough to finish what I started even though I keep wondering why I'm doing it.  So we have cranberry and popcorn garlands on our tree.  For about the only time in my life.

Day 2: Make Candy Cane Reindeer for Great-Grandparents

I thought this would be something he had fun doing.  I thought the eyes, and the noses, and the bells would be fun for him to put on.

He only wanted to be in charge of the glue, which was fine.  I just had to remind myself it was better if I didn't watch.

Day 3: Decorate Wrapping Paper with Finger Paint.

This hasn't happened, maybe in part because I don't want paint all over clothes and he refuses to wear one of Doug's old shirts.  Oh well. 

Instead we played in the fresh-fallen snow and Doug hooked the sled up to the back of the 4-wheeler and we were the crazy neighbors going up and down our road.  We had fun, and thankfully we were about done when the sled broke in half.  It wasn't quite made for that!

Not sure if I'll try to update daily, otherwise I'll have a weekly summary next Saturday.

Do you have any special Christmas traditions?

Christmas Countdown Continued

I didn't take as many pictures as I would have liked, but that's how things seem to go around here.  One week I'll have 50 pictures, and the next I'll have 2.  Here's our projects so far:

Day 6: Make Christmas Trees for Great-Grandparents

This was somewhat successful - I had gotten everything ready ahead of time, and Henry just needed to decorate.  I forget what came up, but we did this a day late and had to hurry after his nap to have them ready to go for the Great-Grandpas.  We got the two done that we needed to, but nowhere near as many as I planned. Before we glued the tree on the tube, I put some waxed paper around the bottom with a rubberband and we filled the trunks with pieces of candy.

Day 7: Visit Great-Grandpas

This went okay, considering that active little boys go haywire as soon as they're in a small confined room.  But the great-grandpas enjoyed seeing him (and us) and I know they don't mind the sudden goofiness as much as his mom does. ;)

Day 8: Buy a Gift to Give Away

I happened to be going shopping with my mom and Rachel on this day, so I thought it was perfect timing.  But I picked out the stuff for our Angel Tree gift (clothes for a girl), and I don't enjoy shopping and forgot (and then didn't put in the extra effort when I remembered) to have him pick something out to drop off at ATLAS.

Day 9: Have Grandparents Over for Supper

This was a huge hit, and I meant to take a picture of everyone together but forgot once we were all sitting by the table.  Henry thought it was just awesome to have ALL of his grandparents together and to himself.  We all had a good time.

Day 10: Make Salt-Dough Ornaments

Basically we played with play dough.  Sticky play dough.   It would have been better if it weren't so sticky, because playing with play dough is fun.  We rolled the dough into balls and then squished them to make snowmen.  Mine was 3 high with the circles getting smaller.  Henry's was 6 high with random sizes.  I liked his better, because no rules = more fun.  No pictures because my hands were too sticky. :)

Day 11: Visit Great-Grandma H

We were snowed in and definitely not driving out of town.  We played outside in the snow and then trekked up the street in the wagon to our cookie exchange.  I had finally bought a saucer this year, but a sled meant for pulling would have been better since the wagon doesn't work that great in the snow.

Day 12: Make and Decorate Cut-out Cookies

This was fun because Dad did it with us, but all we did was cut-out and bake the cookies.  I got out all the Christmas cookie cutter, and then the "boys" came.  Both thought the truck should be a Christmas shape, and I think we had more trucks than anything, and I had to work on both of them to share. ;)

The dough was sticky which I could handle, but the cookies didn't even taste that good.  So I need a new recipe.  And even if I had everything ready to go, Henry wouldn't have had the attention to cut-out the cookies and decorate them in one afternoon/evening anyway.

Day 13: Visit the Nursing Home and Hand out Extra Trees

This hasn't happened yet.  His Christmas party at daycare was that afternoon, and we brought away some cookie platters before that.  Plus we didn't have any extra Christmas trees.

Day 14: Make a Gingerbread House

We did this for family night this week, and it was fun but will hopefully get better over the years!  I had tried to get the house cut out and baked and assembled so it was ready to be decorated without falling apart.  I made the royal icing and put it together right before we had supper, and one of my support cans tipped a little too far and dented our roof.

When we sat down to decorate, Henry sat there with the bowl of Mike & Ikes in front of him eating for about 5 minutes.  Dad decorated his side of the roof perfectly, and Henry & I just did whatever.  It was hard enough convincing him to put the candy on the roof instead of in his mouth!  And we had to vacuum up the sprinkles that I kept hearing fall on the floor anytime Henry moved.

As I was finishing cleaning up, I could hear pieces falling off, and when we got up the next morning Henry saw the totally collapsed house and said, "Uh oh!  I broke it!"  He still claims he broke it even though I told him it fell apart while we were sleeping.

Day 15: Visit Great-Grandma VM

Henry had fun looking at her toolbox she got out to show him, and got to play with some of his (2nd?) cousins that Grandma was watching and lots of fun toys.

Day 16: Make Treats for Friends

My plans for the treats for his friends changed from candy trains to monster magnets.  He helped me "write" his friends names on the tags, but other than that there wasn't much he could do.  Thankfully I have a cool glue gun, or my fingers would be blistered!

More to come next week!