Felt Advent Calendar

 This year I made two of these advent calendars. One for my Sister and Brother -in- law and one for a close friend. I started in July and finished them before December 1st. I am a little O.C.D. with my crafts so I am sure many of you could do it faster. I looked on pinterest for ideas and found this one. There wasn't a pattern, so I freehanded it onto freezer paper and then ironed it onto the felt to cut out the felt. I did this with all of my ornaments as well. I would sketch on paper, trace onto freezer paper, iron freezer paper onto felt, cut out felt, pull off freezer paper. I am happy with the end result. I tried to make it a little more personalized to their family and added ornaments that remind me of them. In the advent calendar above it has the book my sister-in-law published this year, a kiwi bird (because they lived in New Zealand for 3 years) and a movie camera because my brother-in-law majored in film.

 This advent calendar has a tooth (because my friend's husband is an endodontist), Kermit (because my friend is obsessed with the Muppets), and a cupcake for fun.

Snowman Kit

This year for the Kiddos teacher's Christmas gifts I thought it would be fun to give them a snowman kit. All they need to add is snow, which we get plenty of in our neck of the woods.

My favorite part of the kit is the hat. You could buy a hat anywhere for pretty cheap, but I decided to make one. 

To make the hat I cut two circles, one 8.5 inches and one 12.5 inches. I took the 12.5 circle and cut a 8.5 inches hole in the middle. For the height of the hat I cut a rectangle about 23 inches x 4.5 inches. Then I sewed the rectangle with the two short ends together. Next I sewed that ring to the top of the hat (8.5" circle). Then I sewed the top section to the 12.5" circle with a hole. Turn it right side out and you have a cute hat. I did have to take a little out here and there. But this is just rough instructions of how I made it. I embellished it with ribbon and a poinsettia that I made.

The kit includes: 1 hat, 1 fleece scarf, 1 carrot nose (I found a fake carrot at our craft store for 70 cents! I stuck a dowel with glue in the carrot to make it easier to put on the head), black rocks for the eyes and mouth (I painted river rocks black and made a simple drawstring bag out of felt to keep them in), and 3 buttons (these are wooden wheels I painted black and put a dowel in the hole of the wheel to help hold them into the snowman).

To hold all the pieces of the kit I went to a local paint store and bought empty paint cans. I called around to find the best price. Once I got there the guy only charged me for half of the cans, you can't beat that! I decorated the can with vinyl snowflakes.

I hope the teachers like these!

If you have any questions leave me a comment and I'll get back to you.

Heart Wreath

Here is a simple and fun project for Valentine's Day. I got the cute idea and instructions from my friend Rochelle's Blog. Here is the link for the instructions. The project was simple enough the kids were able to help with it and loved it!