Christmas for the office

We wanted to do something for the office staff where S spends part of his time each week. I needed things that were not too sweet and also would be something that S could easily carry to the office since he would have to carry it on the public transportation.

I made banana bread and pumpkin muffins. My banana bread is an old family recipe except I cut the sugar in half. That is such a good way to use up the old bananas that get thrown in the freezer. The pumpkin is from a can but when I open the can I put it in 1/2 cup containers and freeze it so I can make muffins or whatever.

I made some cute easy little cards for S to give to various staff.

It was a hit at the office. In fact, I was asked to give a price list for baked goods for staff meetings and other functions.

Gift Bags

Last week was the Mom's group Christmas tea. This event is the only time that we have a craft or activity for the mom's. I guess someone thought I was creative and so I was asked to come up with an idea.

I thought about a few things and even tried to make the folded star ball ornament but decided that was too labour intensive and had too much instructions. I asked for some suggestions on a forum and someone suggested gift bags.

I put a few samples together and then took supplies and everyone was very creative. It was fun to see what they put together.

I think it was a fun time and it did fulfill the desire for something easy, without lots of instructions, could be done in 30 minutes or so and something that everyone could use.

Now I have three gift bags. I need to find some gifts to put in the bags.

A new Giveaway

A fun giveaway. Oh, my does this look great.

My latest bag

If you know me, you know I love bags. I found these directions but just like I do with my cooking and changing recipes. I did that with the bag as well. Maybe the size given in the instructions works if you are putting the bag in your car but I don't do that and it was too long for me. Also I didn't have double sided fusible fleece so I used some quilting batting that I had and made my handles a different way.

I have not yet tried to make the little pouch that the bag can be stored in but want to try that.

Here is one of the bags that I made and I do think it is cute. Don't tell but the next time I am going to make the handles a bit further apart.

Ornament Exchange

Years ago I enjoyed being part of an ornament exchange. You would make the the same ornament for everyone in the group and then exchange. One of the forums had an exchange and I decided to join in the fun.

Well, the first thing in an ornament exchange is to figure out what to make. I wanted my ornament to reflect me. Plus it had to be something simple cause that is me and had to use things that I had because I was not spending a day to run to the craft store. Ribbon is easy to buy and I did purchase a yard of that.

I had some Chinese silk that I bought and decided to try something with that. You would not believe how difficult it is to find a free pattern online but I finally found one.

Here are my first attempts. I tried with the red fabric first. It is not as stiff as the teal. I didn't like the way they looked. I think some of those were with a modified try to make myself pattern. I thought maybe it was the thin fabric so I tried the stiff teal fabric. They look like field hockey sticks and not stockings.

I showed them to a friend for her opinion and she decided that the red were cute and I think they have a bit more of a Christmas spirit. So I opened the Christmas stocking factory in our house. I did not use any child labour in the production or assembly of these stockings. These do not contain lead but then again I didn't get them tested.

Here is the finished product. Of course, every stocking needs to be stuffed and so I stuffed these plus it makes them look a bit fuller.
I mailed them off and can't wait to see what I get.

Week in Review 11/30

This week's Memory Verse is F:

"For the wages of sin is death."

The book that we are using has short passages for 3 year olds and so we are doing that and then later we will go through and add the rest of the verse.

Colours - I got tired of the 4 colours (3 primary colours plus green) so I added orange. We made orange water and then spent some time matching orange things. She can't say orange but she can read it and put the orange things on that card.

Reading - We have been working with sight words but being able to read individual words is not reading so we made some sentences. Okay, my ESL teacher background comes out -- "Put the subject down, here is the verb, now the object." K drinks milk. and then we change the object K drinks water or we change the subject Daddy drinks milk. We don't bother with momma drinks milk because that is not true. When we started reading drinks K couldn't say the word but now she has something that sounds like drinks. This encourages me to keep going and to teach her new words.

Concepts - we have been working on big and small as well as circle - still need some work but that is okay.

Letters - we are continuing to review these since that is what we are to be doing in the lesson plans.

Montessori learning - I really like the practical life and sensory learning of Montessori. I have collected and made some things over the past few years. My favourite book is a very easy one to read Teaching Montessori in the Home The Preschool Years. We decided to add a few of those activities into our week. This week we worked on pouring rice. We still need to practice a bit more. It is a good activity because it requires careful movement in the pouring - we are learning to pour and not dump.

I don't think I have any pictures from this week. I will have to make sure that next week I get some pictures to include.