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?

Final Christmas Countdown Update

I know this is a little after the fact, but even though our last week was hit or miss with the activities, I'm still happy with how the project turned out.

Day 17: Watch a Christmas Movie
This almost didn't happen because I needed to get a movie from the library, and good Christmas movies were always checked out from our public library and the local college library.  That morning I looked online and the Muppet's Christmas Carol was in, so I left work at 8:59 to go get it. We had our movie night, ate homemade pizza on the couch, and later had hot chocolate but skipped the popcorn since none of us were hungry.  The downside - it's not "Cars" and barely held Henry's attention.  He kept asking where Kermit was, which was almost constant since Kermit does NOT have a leading role.  How the Grinch stole Christmas may have been better, but we own it on VHS and no longer have a VCR connected to our TV.  Oh well.

Day 18: Go Sledding

This was fun.  We went on a tiny little hill behind the school just down the block from us, which was perfect because Henry could climb back up all by himself even carrying the sled.  He had a blast, and Mom and Dad were there just to push him down the hill.  He even tipped back in the sled and went down the hill with his head bouncing off the ground and came up laughing.  Crazy kid.  And then he and Dad tried to sled down the road home.  That didn't work so well.

Day 19: Bake Surprise Meringues
This went pretty much the same as our other baking days: I did it by myself with him popping in every once in a while, mostly to snoop chocolate chips.

Day 20: Bring Treats to Neighbors
We actually brought a few plates of treats to a few local businesses we deal with instead, and Henry came home with a pocket full of suckers and tootsie rolls  I'm not sure who came out ahead on that deal!

Day 21: Look at Christmas Lights
Henry had in his mind he wanted to be doing something else and kept asking to go home, the chauffeur began the trip by saying there's nothing real impressive to look at in town, and Mom was getting frustrated because apparently she's the only one who wants to have fun.  Not the most successful night. :)

Day 22: Wrap Presents and Stuff Stockings
Actually, our stockings never got hung, again.  I started by wrapping Henry's presents when he was supposed to be having some quiet time, and barely got done before he showed up in the office.  He helped some, mostly putting on tape, but then he got sent out of the room when he started using the wrapped presents as step stools.

Day 23: Sleep by the Christmas Tree

This was one of the most successful things, even though none of us got a great night's sleep.  But we didn't have to go to work in the morning so it wasn't a big deal.

Day 24: Make Christingle Candles for Tomorrow's Breakfast
(Chrstingle Candles are the oranges with the cloves and cranberries with a hole for a candle)  Didn't happen.  Not only that but my "special" Christmas breakfast never happened either.  But we left early afternoon for our Christmas party with Doug's side of the family and had lots of fun sledding and eating and sharing gifts.

Day 25: Read Luke 2 After Breakfast
We did have a good breakfast, although I forget what we had.  Probably waffles since that's what Doug usually requests and I rarely make.  We read Luke 2 and then the rest of the day flew by. 

We got ready for church then packed up food, presents, snow clothes, games, toys, extra clothes.  We opened our presents as a family, went to church, came home, changed clothes, piled in the car, went to an extended family Christmas dinner, went straight to Christmas with my side of the family and went sledding again, ate, exchanged gifts, and got home late and exhausted.

Which pretty much sums up my reasons for wanting to do this countdown calendar.  So much emphasis (and pressure) is put on a single day and for parents of young children, this day can often be less than enjoyable with the busyness it brings before it comes to a screeching halt.  It's supposed to be a season of joy celebrating the fact that our Savior came to earth to save us, and doing this helped us slow down a little and enjoy doing some things together and do a little more giving.

What I would change?
Having the grandparents over and sleeping by the tree were definitely the most talked about (therefore most enjoyed) by our 2 year old.
I had a lot of activities, partly because I wanted to do a lot, and partly because the only alternative seemed to be treats.  Next year I'm going to cut back a little - this year I easily got away with skipping activities if it was getting too busy, but I may not always be that lucky.
With the right activities, this can be a great teaching tool as Henry grows.
We will definitely be making this a tradition!

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!

Christmas Activities, December 1-5

December 1: Put up the Christmas Tree and Decorations

We had fun putting up the tree, listening to Mannheim Steamroller and drinking hot chocolate with marshmallows.  Henry had about 6 ornaments hanging from the one branch, so I did have to a little re-arranging. :)  I had a church supper to help at on Wednesday, so rather than make Henry miss his nap to get the tree up, we did this on Thursday. Dad ended up taking the afternoon off and got to hang out with us too.

Both fell asleep on the couch afterward.

December 2:  Decorate Wrapping Paper
December 3:  Make Christmas Finger Jello

Because of the delay in putting the tree up, we did both of these activities on Friday.  We made red and green finger jello and cut it into Christmas shapes, although Henry kept calling the cross was a "plus."  We also decorated kraft paper with paint, glue, and glitter.  There was less than half the jar of white glitter left, a little more than half of blue, and there wasn't that much surface area to cover!

December 4:  Make Supper and Bring Some Away

I had supper made, all ready to go, and Henry refused to go for a car ride.  Since these would be surprise drop-offs, I had planned chili soup and cinnamon rolls - something that could easily be froze or saved for the next day, so I didn't push it.  I wasn't going to bring it away by myself just to get it done, and I wasn't going to force Henry to go and turn it into a miserable activity.  Instead, we brought them away as a family after church today and left the surprises by back doors for them to come home to.

December 5:  Make Star Cookies with Mom

Sometimes Henry just gets excited about taking off the numbers, acts excited about the activity I tell him, and then goes off to play trucks again.  At least today he knew what was involved and went straight to the kitchen table to push the chair across the kitchen.

He always has fun mixing, but he also has a short attention span and got in trouble for opening the oven door (even though it wasn't on yet), and disappeared right before what I thought was the fun stuff.  He did show back up to roll a few cookies in sugar, tried to take over my job of scooping balls and started to treat it like play dough, pushed a few stars in the hot cookies and then disappeared again.

Along with a few stars. 

I know I can't expect "perfect" activities if I want to have fun, so I remind myself: flexibility is key!

Advent Fun and My Giving Update

I can't say I was a complete success with the 30 Day Giving Challenge.  I had fun trying to come up with new ways to give and it pushed me to do some things I may have normally claimed were "too much work."

I managed a "Ring and Run" (actually a Ding and Drive) with an anonymous gift; I made cards for Operation Write Home and proceeded to use the cards to give to others; I left a treat for our mailman which he must not have realized was for him and left it there; and other miscellaneous things to help out neighbors and family that had more or less success.

About halfway through the month I slacked off.  "Recording" my giving started to feel pointless as I realized a lot of what I was doing was stuff that I would normally be doing anyway.  But what I took from it was not the benefit of "giving" for 30 days straight, but some encouragement to occasionally go above and beyond what I normally do, even if it's out of my comfort zone.  (I must say it's kind of uncomfortable ringing a doorbell and rushing to your car, trying not to look suspicious, but not knowing what you'll do if they come to the door before you can get away.)

On to Christmas!

I've been wanting a Christmas tradition that would add some fun, but couldn't quite describe what I wanted.  Stockings on Christmas Eve; Christmas breakfast and presents together as a family before church and the busyness of the day; it's some nice time together as a family but it still wasn't quite what I was hoping for.  But I didn't know what I was hoping for.

And then I discovered/thought of/combined from a million sources a form of an advent calendar combined with a Christmas countdown.  But I didn't want candy or trinkets.

So we have 25 days of activities for our family to do.  And it fits perfectly with what I was hoping to accomplish.  A tradition that makes this a season of fun and giving and not just a whole lot of commercial hoopla over one day of "gimme gimme" gift receiving.

I made bottle cap magnets with the numbers 1-25, cut out squares of Christmas paper (that I had to print from my digital supplies), and wrote our activities on the back.  My original plan was to use a cookie sheet since our fridge isn't magnetic.  Unfortunately my pans are airbake and also not magnetic, there weren't any at the second hand store when I looked, and I didn't feel like buying a magnetic board right now.  So I used my mini muffin tin, flipped it over and stuck them to the back.  Although I may need to clear if off or change one of my baking items I had planned for Christmas...


I explained the calendar to Henry yesterday and he went, "Oh, yaay!" and clapped.  I'm not sure he completely understands what we're doing as he's responded this way to random things throughout the past few weeks, but I know he'll enjoy it.  And I'm excited too, especially since I usually put our tree up the weekend after Thanksgiving and this year I've had to wait!

Anyway, check back as I'm excited about this and will be posting regular updates on our activities.  Not sure I'll post each day, but I'll do at least a summary each week.