Christmas Countdown: Co-Worker Gift

MMMmm.... Slow Cooker Pear and Apple Butter from Martha Stewart.  A couple months ago my mom gave me 2 years worth of her Martha Stewart Everyday Food mini magazines, along with a lot of tasty dinner ideas I pulled this easy version of apple butter. 

Perfect for an easy homemade gift, it didn't take too much prep and once you got everything together you could kind of forget about it for awhile.  Boy did my house smell delicious for a few days. 

Here's a link to the full recipe but basically combine equal parts pears and apples with about a cup of brown sugar, a cinnamon stick and pinch of salt.  Cook on high 4 hours, take out cinnamon sticks and process in blender, pour back into slow cooker and cook on high lid off for 6-8 hours.  Mixture will be thick and dark brown when you're done.  Pour into containers and freeze or refrigerate.

There  you go this year's DIY co-worker gift enjoy everyone!  Side note I had to remember to post this at the end of the week not to give away any secrets to this year's gift- it's so much better when you don't know what you're getting.  I am not a Christmas snooper until some others in my house. ( I wasn't going to go there but not a Christmas pooper either!) 

Christmas Countdown: Teacher Gifts

We found some Christmas Mugs, $1, and some holiday treats all around $4 for Cy's Pre-K teachers.

And they're all wrapped up ready to go for his Christmas Party Thursday! Quite the exciting week for a four year old- Wednesday is pajama day and Polar Express Movie with hot cocoa, Thursday class party and oh of course this weekend..........CHRISTMAS!

And a little update... Cy's present for the kids in his class: DIY chunky crayons  received some packaging.  

Now only if I was this prepared with the rest of our gifts!  Time to get to work, hope you enjoy a few short posts this week while I finish up alot of last minute projects and wrapping.  Merry Christmas Week!!

Homemade: Kid's Felt Cookie Playset

Every year I make the kids, mine and the cousins, a homemade Christmas present.  You can give them so many toys but something homemade really comes from the heart.  So this year’s present started a few months back with one of Cy’s book orders from school.  I got each of the boys a Pirate Gingerbread book and my niece The Gingerbread Girl book. 

I knew I wanted the present to be something along the line of cookie making, but honestly didn’t think this was going to be their homemade gift.  I was leaning towards mixing bowl, cookie mix and oven mitts, something that would be a fun project for them to use.

dana-made-it.com

But that changed when I saw this post from Dana on her Made blog.  She has a great, well followed blog filled with original, fun ideas and patterns not to mention awesome photo shoots of projects and her kids.  This post was the Cookie Jar post, a tote bag with a vinyl “cookie jar” on the outside for an assortment of homemade felt cookies.  At first sight I knew my kids would LOVE to play with those cookies.

So this year’s homemade kid’s present was born: Felt Cookie Playset.  Each set of kids gets a canvas bag with a felt “cookie jar” on the outside holding felt cookies, inside is their book, a cookie pan and cooling rack with a spatula. 

I made the canvas bags with canvas material I had from a throw tarp (get and a lot cheaper when stretching your own painting canvases), I didn’t really measure it just made sure the pans would fit inside.  The straps are red ribbon to match the stitching on the “cookie jar” and to be a little festive.  After the bag was sewn I hand stitched the “cookie jar” white felt and the black felt lid on, leaving the mouth open to put the cookie in.

The felt cookies were the fun part to make, thinking up all sorts of favorites and how to make them.  We definitely needed a gingerbread man to go with their books, classic chocolate chip, peanut butter, heart sandwich- jam cookies, chocolate “oreos”.  I stopped there because I needed to make 6 of each kind so each set could have 2 of each cookie.  (My kids have already lost their chocolate chips and a jam cookie so I think my job will never be done)

The cookie pan, cooling rack and spatula were Dollar Tree finds.  They have a great assortment of kids baking items in the kitchen section- and you can never go wrong for $1.  

 There you go this year's DIY kid's present.  Cookie time!

Explore Art: DIY Chunky Melted Crayons

This project has been done before, and I'm sure you've seen tutorials all over the internet.  But to be a true craft, art or family blog- you've got to have this, it's kids fun 101.   So here we go:

Melted Chunky Crayons

I love this DIY crayon project, I've used it in several ways through the past 4 1/2 years as a mom.  This year we made chunky, muffin tin crayons for Cy's Pre-K class Christmas presents.  It's an easy project, great way to use up broken pieces of crayons and kids can help.

You need crayons, muffin tin and your oven.  You can save up and use all broken pieces that accumulate over time.  Cy has actually been taking really good care of his crayons and Sage hasn't gotten into to many- so I got out some boxes of Crayolas from September when they were 20 cents.

Peel the paper wrapped off all the crayons.  You can use scissors to slice down the side and get them off easier.  Note if you use you're husbands pocket knife and he tells you its sharp, chances are it is.  Nice little knick out of my thumb, don't worry I didn't use that crayon! 

Once they are peeled break them into little pieces, anywhere from an inch to three inches.  This part I let Cy do and he had a lot of fun.

Preheat the oven to 275 and drop the crayon pieces into the muffin tins.  Your choice if you want different shades of blue in one or a little of everything like we did.  Fill almost to the top.  

Once they are all filled pop the muffin tin into the oven for 8 to 10 minutes until you can see all the crayons are melted.

When they came out melted Cy took a BBQ skewer and swirled the tops.  This is optional.  Either set them aside to cool or put in the fridge/ freezer to speed up the process.

And there you have it.... a dozen chunky melted crayons!

These are fun for any kids to use but really great for little kids.  It's easier for them to hold on to, helps with hand coordination.

So we're not quite done with our DIY Christmas Class presents we still have to think of how to wrap them but stay tune and I'll let you know.......