Holiday Season

2014 is coming to end. It has been a hard year for my family. We have suffered the loss and grief of loved ones passing. It has been a year that forced us to draw back and reflect and focus and cherish our time together. Not a year full of running around busy with activity. But a time of drawing in and focusing on each other and the things that really matter to us, and also . . .  dealing with our grief.

This Holiday season we have found joy in the simple things. Watching our kids run around and pull the stockings off the wall. Going for walks to pick up pinecones. Decorating the tree together and taking care of our new little kittens. We decorated two trees this year one small one inside that sits on the kitchen counter. Out of the reach of our one year old.

And one outdoor tree that sits on our porch. Also out of reach of our one year old. Pretty smart, uh? Our Christmas craft this year was making pinecone decorations. My daughter loved helping with this and we all carried them outside and put them on the tree, even my one year old 🙂

Here is what we did. We put a little hot glue on the end of the pinecone.

Next, we pressed a piece of garden twine into the glue and looped it once. I put more glue on top the looped twine for added security.

To finish we brought the ends up and tied a bow. Really simple but really pretty too. The bigger the pinecones the better it looks.

Later, after Christmas, we will move this tree off our porch and into our yard where we can use our pinecone ornaments to feed the birds. We will do this by spreading peanut butter onto the pinecones and rolling them in bird seed and hanging them on the tree again. We will see how that goes:) Never done it before.

I am also really glad to be done with my shopping and gift wrapping. Whuhooo!

I love the recycled brown wrapping paper you can buy now. I think it is so pretty, and I like to tie simple raffia bows around my packages.

I hope everyone has a great Christmas! Enjoy your families and all the things in life that are the most important:  God and each other.

Merry Christmas!!

How was your holiday season? Did you make a holiday craft with your kids?  What was it?