An Imperfectly Merry Christmas

It has been awhile. I know. I have been super busy, so I have a lot to update here on the blog. If you are looking for something crafty, there is not so much of that in this post. However, I feel the need to do more writing about real life.

In November, I was asked to be a part of a MOPS panel on Holiday traditions and encouraging thankfulness and kindness in our children. I did mention some of the things that our family does, but I also confessed many of the ways I have messed up over the years struggling to keep up with traditions that weren't working and striving for Pinterest-worthy Christmas perfection. I have come to realize that I need to simplify many areas of my life.

A few weeks later, a last-minute, long term subbing position came up at the elementary school. I thought it sounded like fun and a good challenge for me! I love staying home with my youngest, but this was only for a few weeks leading up until Christmas and it helped our family financially.

There were so many things that I never saw coming...

First, I remembered how much I miss teaching!

Second, I am now a coffee drinker.

Third, there were some extra challenges for our family. I knew it would be hard and that we would all have to pitch in to make it work. Oh, but we faced trials that left me scratching my head and wondering why I ever thought I should take this position. Seriously. It was the worst possible timing. I was broken and humbled, stressed out and reduced to tears. But, I had to put it aside and put on a smile for my class because that is what they needed.

On my last day, I mentioned my pefectionistic tendencies and someone was surprised that I still had any of that left with having six children. It dawned on me that with so many of the things I had been going through, I had no other choice but to let go of some of my perfectionism over the past few weeks. I can see that more and more of it has been chipping away over time, with a larger chunk knocked off more recently.

christmas mess

For our school's Christmas Around the World, we presented the country of Italy. One of the things that we taught the students was about the legend of La Befana. Here is the gist of it... La Befana was an old woman who was very dedicated to cleaning her house. The three wise men stopped to ask directions to Bethlehem and invited her to come with them to see the Christ Child. She was too busy sweeping her house, so she declined. However, that night when she saw the great light in the sky she realized her mistake. She grabbed a bag with some toys that had belonged to her own child and ran to catch up with the wise men. She ran so fast that she began to fly on her broomstick. She never could find the Christ Child, so instead she leaves gifts in the stockings of the children of Italy each year.

This really made me think. I may not be consumed with having a perfectly clean house (a great housekeeper I am not!), but I do get wrapped up in my tasks and my quest for perfection in other areas instead of seeking Christ.

Last year, I ruined Christmas Eve for my family with a meltdown/tantrum that involved my failure to sew new stockings, a poor movie choice by others, an attempted new tradition of Christmas pajamas that were opened without me, complete flipping out, tears, and apologies. It was MY FAULT, MY PERFECTIONISM, MY SELFISHNESS. I promised myself that this year would be better.

But, to do that, I had to let go and simplify.

Instead of stockings, which I still haven't made, I stuffed everything in gift bags. I even let the kids help wrap each others' gifts (although they were threatened to maintain secrecy). It was a way for the girls and I to get some one-on-one time together on Christmas Eve Eve and they loved being in on the Christmas secrets. We had a Merry Christmas!

gift bag stockings

How to wrap earmuffs!

I hardly did any decorating. I let the kids put things wherever they wanted. Less hassle for me. More fun for them. My pumpkins and mums were still on the porch up until Christmas Day, when the boys took the pumpkins away... to use them for target practice. My poinsettia lost all of its leaves, but the girls liked seeing the new growth on it and won't let me throw it out. Even without fabulous decorations, we STILL had a Merry Christmas!

leaves fell off of the ponsettia

I hand delivered a lot of our Christmas cards and the rest were last-minute or late. I am sure the recipients did not love them any less and I bet they still had a Merry Christmas!

I started decorating our tree with colored lights and changed my mind halfway through. Then, the white lights stopped working on half of the strand. I planned to fix it later, but while I was upstairs, the girls decorated it. The ribbon was perfectly spaced, but the few ornaments they put on did not match. I never had time to fix it, so we were left with a very original tree that made people smile. It was still a MERRY CHRISTMAS!

half colored lights and half white lights on the tree

So, things might be a hot mess around here, but letting go of my own ridiculous ideas and perfectionism feels so freeing. I am so grateful for even those awful trials that helped me to simplify this year!

Merry Christmas!

Bitty Baby Doll Clothes

Hey there! I am still around. And, believe it or not, I have been super crafty lately, too. The thing is, I just don't get a chance to blog about it.

My 12yo has also taken over my sewing area. She is sewing lots of doll clothes! Most of them are for American Girl or 18" dolls, but someone asked if she could make doll clothes for a Bitty Baby.

She made a dress and matching diaper out of this cute owl fabric. It is a peasant dress- modified from the pattern we usually use for 18" dolls.

Bitty Baby Owl Dress

Then, she upcycled some clothing items for a headband and dress - scraps from a new shirt I bought on clearance to make toddler leggings and a cotton girls' top.

Bitty Baby Peasant Dress

Both outfits turned out really adorable! I especially love the little diaper.

Bitty Baby Doll Clothes

She has a lot more doll clothes that I will probably blog about eventually. We also have our own patterns for these clothes to share... one day. Things are a little crazy right now, so I am just trying to take pictures when I remember and I can always blog about it later, whenever that may be.

But right now, I have to go make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

DIY I Spy Bottles

I have so many crafty things to share on the blog, but I just haven't had time to edit pics and type up posts. I don't things will ever settle down around here. Here is another MOPS craft projects. We did this at our open gym gathering. Usually the kids just run loose and we can chat while we let them burn some energy. I just set up a table off to the side with this extra craft project to do with the kids if they were interested. It seemed to go really well and the kids had fun choosing items to put in their bottles.

I-Spy Bottles MOPS craft

I Spy Bottles for MOPS Creative Activities- fun to do with the kids

You will need...

~plastic bottles ~rice ~funnel ~scoop ~sharpie marker ~hot glue gun ~assorted trinkets

For the trinkets to include in the bottle, some of us just collected assorted choking hazards and craft supplies. We had alphabet beads, seashells, buttons, toys, feathers, colored beans, metallic confetti (this looked great in the bottle!), animal beads, charms, etc.

They were really easy to make...

1. Choose a clean, dry, plastic bottle. I brought small Gatorade bottles, but some people had some really nice bottles from other beverages.

2. Fill the bottle partway with rice. We used a funnel and a scoop.

3. Choose small trinkets to place in the bottle.

4. Add more rice until the bottle is nearly full, but leave plenty of space to roll the rice around.

5. Hot glue the lid onto the bottle.

6. The step we skipped... write the child's name on the lid with a Sharpie.

I love craft projects with kids that are actually useful and last more than a few days!

Composition Book Journals

I am super excited to be leading creative activities for our MOPS group this year! For our first meeting, I was asked to come up with a craft project. I put a lot of thought into it and spent a lot of time on Pinterest. ;) I ended up deciding on these composition book journals. It was a very economical craft project and there are some materials left over for some future projects, too. I got a cute scrapbook paper pad on sale at Joann's, then cut each of the 180 pages into pieces the size of the composition book covers. (That took a long time!) I gathered some cute embellishments- ribbon, ric rac, lace, stickers, washi tape, etc. I also stamped some cardstock with some cute rubber stamps and cut them out to give more options. Extra paper trimmings, cardstock, and even paint samples gave everyone a lot of options. I cut some tag shapes out with my paper punch and stamped them with phrases like "starry eyed", "hope", and "wonder" to incorporate this years' theme. We also gave the options of using glue sticks or mod podge to adhere the paper to the book. Both seemed to work fine.

These are my best tips:

• I cut my paper at 9 3/4" by 6 5/8"- double check your notebook size and if in doubt cut it bigger and trim later. It was more effecient to make a template, then use it mark the back of a paper lightly with pencil. Stack 3 or so together and use a paper slicer to cut them all at once. The leftover strips were spread out at the tables to be used as accents.
• If using glue sticks, apply heavily to the paper, especially the edges. Use the side of your fist to smooth it all out.
• If using mod podge, brush a thin layer onto the book and carefully smooth the paper onto it. Do NOT mod podge over the paper.
• Keep checking the corners to see if they are lifting up and reapply glue as needed.
• After it is dry, open up the book and trim any excess that may stick out over the edges and the corners.
• Use hot glue to apply ribbon and ric rac. Other embellishments seem to be fine with glue sticks.
• We added envelopes inside the covers to hold notes, papers, etc. Someone also covered the inside cover with scrapbook paper, which looked great if you have extra paper!
• Make sure you have a wide variety of embellishments that coordinate with the papers.
• Spread the embellishments out and make sure that there is enough room for people to gather around the tables.

These are the samples that I made before the meeting. They will be used as gifts to welcome new moms during the year.

The backs are also covered with coordinating papers.

I think this one is my favorite. It is simple, but so pretty!

I incorporated this years' theme verse on the cover of this one. I couldn't find papers that coordinated with the Starry Eyed theme, so I added it in a few of the journals as best as I could.

After the meeting, I found composition books on clearance SUPER cheap, so I got some more. I had bought another pad of paper for myself because I loved the prints and colors. So, my daughters helped themselves to my craft supplies and made their own journals. Apparently, this makes a really easy kids craft, too!

They are being used as art and writing journals. They made a few others that I didn't snap pics of and are using them at school. They used glue stick and they are still holding up well.

They even found some mini ones and made a coordinating doll journal!

Overall, this was a successful and EASY craft project! It was simple enough that anyone could do it, but had so many creative options for those who want to challenge themselves a bit more.

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Doll Clothes Sewn by a 12yo

My 12yo daughter began making doll clothes this summer. She wanted some expensive shoes for school and would have exceeded her school shopping allotment. So, I told her she had to find a way to earn money to buy them herself. She began designing and sewing doll clothes (with a lot of help) and earned enough to get those shoes (YAY for a sale!), some additional clothes, gifts for friends, and add to her washi tape collection. She began by using clothes from our donation bag as a fabric source. So, the initial start-up was $0. It was hard to find things that matched in the bag. Some of the finished doll clothes had to be kept because they didn't pass my quality control. I also had to help her a lot with the T-shirts.

She also made matching beaded bracelets to go with each outfit as her signature accent.

After the first doll clothes sold, she reinvested a small amount in fabric with plans to create a "fall collection". We came up with two simple patterns that worked well with cotton fabric- a 3/4 sleeve peasant tunic and a simple dress. She upcycled some shirts from the donation bag to make the leggings and headbands, which were soooooo soft! This time, she only needed a little bit of help with sewing some details, like velcro or topstitching. When everything was finished we did an official photo shoot.

She sold out very quickly and had requests for more, so she decided to make a few more outfits. Again, she reinvested part of her income to get more fabric. This time, she also bought knit to match her fabrics, so the leggings had to be hemmed. For some reason, things didn't go as well this time. I unknowingly folded the top of a pattern piece before we cut the fabric and several pair of leggings came out too short. She had to do a lot of seam-ripping for various errors. Also, she accidentally ruined the skirt of a dress by catching it with the cutting blade on the overlock machine. She wanted to quit several times and learned an important sewing technique... walking away! After a few weeks they were finally finished.

She wants to make more in the future, but this was a good lesson for her. She learned some sewing skills, but she also learned to persevere when things are challenging and how to work towards a goal. Sometimes, the work ethic and thought process that accompany learning something new can be the truly valuable lesson.