Thanksgiving was good, but busy. We visited both sides of our family, and ate two big meals!
OK, so I haven't bought into the Handmade Holiday concept completely, but I am trying to make some Christmas gifts this year. When I received the JoAnn mailer with their day-after-Thanksgiving savings, I thought I would zip on over on Friday to pick up a few things.
Big mistake.
I planned on being at JoAnn at 6 am (!!) and figured I would be home by 7:30. How naive. The parking lot was packed when I arrived (at 6:06) but I found a space and headed toward the snuggle flannel, on sale for $.99/yard. It was crazy. People were just throwing bolts into their carts willy nilly. I commented to one woman whose cart was overflowing that I would have to shop her cart after she went through the cutting line.
"Oh, no," she replied. "I'm buying all of this. And those three other carts over there."
She and her mother and sister bought 1,000 yards of flannel. I don't even know where I would store all that.
So after a two hour 20 minute wait in the cutting line, I left JoAnn with a few yards of fabric and some craft supplies. And then I had to rush home, because I had 20 family members coming over for our extended family Thanksgiving celebration. Ack!
My mother's side of the family (my grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and cousins' kids) always get together around Thanksgiving. I'm not sure when this tradition began, but the guys always end up watching football so the rest of us create a Christmas craft! Someone comes up with an idea, brings the supplies and we sit, chat, and learn a new craft.
This year we made felt ornaments. This was great for both the kids (with a little help from the adults) and the adults. Here are our craftings:
And I enjoyed making these so much, and they are so easy, that I made more today:
I plan on posting a brief tutorial tomorrow on how to make these cute felt ornaments. In the meantime, 'tis the season to de-lurk! And how do you get blog visitors to de-lurk?? Have a giveaway!!
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Need something to say in your comment? How about: What's your favorite holiday family tradition??
P.S. When I was talking to my mom about the supplies we would need for this craft I mentioned buttons. She said "Oh here, use these." She promptly pulled out a huge stash of buttons that belonged to my grandmother and great-grandmother. I had no idea she had these, or I would have been scrounging through them years ago! Even the containers are vintage and awesome!
5 comments:
I'm surprised I'm the first comment! Those vintage buttons are really great. I remember my mom had this huge jar of buttons and we used to love dumping them on the floor and trying to find matches...there were rarely matches.
My snowflake pillow is no further than it was when I posted about it. I"m way too swamped with Christmas gift projects. I really want to quit my job and craft all day!
Your ornaments are cute!
I love your little ornaments - very colourful! I really enjoy our advent stocking tradition where we pull out an activity to do each day. Your Christmas ornaments are a brilliant addition to them as I know my girls will love doing those.
And that, my friend, is why I never, ever, under any circumstance, leave the house to go anywhere on Black Friday. But, then again, I miss out on all of those great stories! :) See you next Saturday!
B- I knew about the buttons. I have several on items that Mom has sewn for me. If you still have them at Christmas, I expect access! Love Jen
I love your family tradition. I will give it a try this year. I'm always looking for new ideas. A tradition that my now grown kids love is helping to fill the Christmas stockings. Each person brings one gift for everyone elses stocking. The gifts range from socks to candy, magazines,lip balm, you name it. I love it because it takes the pressure off of Santa having to fill all those stockings.
So glad to see you back.
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