. seeing stars .

we have talked and talked and talked about the star that the wise men saw that led them to Jesus.  toddlers like (and need) repetition, so as i may be getting tired of reading the same words, they are still loving it.  the Christmas story is my favorite to share with my kids and definitely one story i want engrained in their little brains.  and i read it straight from the Bible, so it's kind of too long for them, but the importance is them hearing.  at this age, most likely, even if they are sitting and looking at you, they are hearing you. 

today, after reading the Christmas story, we made stars.

we're down to the simple here, folks.  these babies attention spans are quite short these days.  they are so busy.  this craft, however, made them focus on a small thing.  they had to color each popsicle stick individually.  i wasn't able to take pictures of them doing it b/c i was having to keep markers off the table and the floor and was holding the popsicle sticks for them to color.  so, as simple as it was, i was tired at the end.  the big girls spend quite a bit of time on theirs, making sure to color it all in.

some hot glue and a little piece of twine and it was a super cute ornament.

(ps.  i tried doing handprint wreaths and it was a fail.  maybe next week.)

. handprint ornaments .

today we made our first ornaments for Christmas!  i think i got more joy out of the whole thing than the babies did, but it was so worth it.  i think they turned out so cute.  here's what we did ...

mix together..
2 cups flour
1 cup salt
1 cup water

form into a ball and flatten out into a circle.  press hand into dough.  i used a pencil to make 2 small holes in the top for the ribbon.  then baked at 200* for 3 hours.  here's the end result ...