~Family Advent Calendar #1~

Ignore the drill holes in the wall. We haven't gotten around to mending them... ANYWAY! Here's a twist to the paper-chain that we usually do for Christmas to keep the kids from asking in a whiny voice, "How many days until Christmas?" I found this idea somewhere in blogland and I regret I can't give credit where credit is due. I do have to say, it took us 3 tries to get this together. Not because it looks complicated, it's pretty straight-forward actually. It's because our various methods of securing the rings together failed miserably until we finally used the old stand-by: TAPE!

~Family Advent Calendar #2~

Now this one we're pretty excited about. Hero & I came up with 24 family activities and while I think we're going to smack ourselves in the foreheads for the amount of busy-ness it's going to create, it'll be an awesome way to create memories and spend time actually doing something as a family.

Here are the cards we put together. FYI - I realized that I hate tracing patterns. ICK! The trees were easy to do. Triangles & wah-la! On the back of each card, I put an activity strip. (Btw - Like my work station, the piano bench? The couch is the comftiest place for me rather than at the kitchen table. And it's easier to just drag the bench over.)

Here is the final product and if I do say so myself, it looks pretty darn festive & cute! We'll save the cards for next year and create new strips to attach to the back. (I forgot to mention, I can just remove the strip, easy-peasy.)

Tonight's 1st activity? We watched the movie, "The Snowman" which we LOVE for the music and art-work. Our treat was mint hot-chocolate with little candy-canes. YUM! The kids loved it all and that, my dear friends, is what it's all about.