STL: Mommy and Me journal with Delia from Delia Creates

Hi everyone! We're back today, Sharing the Love with another one of my favorite bloggers, Delia from Delia Creates. I just kinda love Delia's blog. She sews awesome stuff, her photos are gorgeous, AND she has the coolest ideas for fun projects to work on with your kids. (Did you see the dice roll-a-recipe for helping your kids learn their numbers? It was genius!) So Delia's pretty much awesome, plus I kind of want to gobble up her adorable baby girl. Is that a bad thing? Anyway, Delia's here today with another genius idea to help you connect with the important people in your life - your kids! - in an innovative way. Thanks Delia!

Hi there!

I think Autumn's series is so brilliant and needed at this time of year, don't you?

I had been wanting to implement my project for today for a while, but I needed this inspiring series to get me to move on it!

It's a simple idea. I call it:

(Keep reading for more info!)

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STL: felt monsters to make with your kids {plus free mix-n-match pattern}

Hey everyone! It's week two of Share the Love: projects that bring people together, and we'd had some fantastic posts so far. (Click here for links to all the posts so far). We have three more guest posters joining us this week as well as another giveaway (the Ribbon Retreat giveaway from last week stays open through Wed!) coming up. And I'm starting off the fun this week with a great project you can do with your kids: mix-n-match felt monsters.

My four-year-old and I spent a few happy hours last week designing, cutting out, and sewing up a monster for him. We had such a great time that I created a mix-n-match PDF pattern, which includes five different monster bodies, five different sets of eyes, five mouths, and five different accessories. (Keep reading for the free pattern and instructions on how to make and customize your own monster.) 

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STL: fortune cookies with Simple Simon and Co

 We're starting this week off with a clever tutorial from Elizabeth, who blogs along with Liz at Simple Simon and Co. (It's share the love time, remember? Projects that help you connect with people during this chilly and often lonely time of year.) I've been clicking over to Simple Simon and Co every couple of days for at least a year to check out both ladies' gorgeous sewing projects (have you seen the Audrey Hepburn outfits they made for their girls? to die for adorable!), read their awesome "The Art of Homemaking" posts, and see if we agree on who should win this current season of Project Runway. Today, Elizabeth has a simple and sweet way to let the important people in your life know you care about them: felt fortune cookies with a sweet sentiment inside.

(Keep reading for the tutorial!)

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learning colors book {kids can do it}

My kids love giving each other Christmas gifts, but I'm tired of taking them and their limited budgets to the dollar store so they can buy each other junk :) so this year I'm trying to be a little bit imaginative in helping them come up with things they can make for each other. I helped my four year old make this "learn your colors book" for his almost 2-yr old baby sister. It cost less than $2 and my little boy had a blast putting it together - he's so excited for his little sister to open it on Christmas morning.

 

Can't you tell? Inside there are ten pictures of James in different colored t-shirts so baby girl can start learning to identify her colors. And no, James doesn't have that many different colored t-shirts - I took one photo and then changed the color in Photoshop Elements - and it's easy! and you can do it too. (And the little board book came from the dollar store - we just printed out photos and glue-sticked them in.)

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lessons from the nativity {baby Jesus ornament}

***This is the fourth installment in my lessons from the nativity series, where I'm sharing some activities I'm doing with my kids this Christmas season. We're talking about what we learn from different characters in the nativity story, then making ornaments to go along with what we discuss. I've included scriptures, songs, discussion questions, and step-by-step tutorials for making each ornament. Find them all here:  angel | star |manger | Baby Jesus***

The Baby Jesus teaches us to BE LIKE HIM

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lessons from the nativity {manger ornament}

***This is the third installment in my lessons from the nativity series, where I'm sharing some activities I'm doing with my kids this Christmas season. We're talking about what we learn from different characters in the nativity story, then making ornaments to go along with what we discuss. I've included scriptures, songs, discussion questions, and step-by-step tutorials for making each ornament. Find them all here: angel | star | manger | Baby Jesus***

The manger teaches us to LOVE EVERYONE, regardless of their circumstances.

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lessons from the nativity {star ornament}

***This is the second installment in my lessons from the nativity series, where I'm sharing some activities I'm doing with my kids this Christmas season. We're talking about what we learn from different characters in the nativity story, then making ornaments to go along with what we discuss. I've included scriptures, songs, discussion questions, and step-by-step tutorials for making each ornament. Find them all here: angel | star | manger | Baby Jesus***

The star teaches us to BELIEVE.

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lessons from the nativity {angel ornament}

***This is the first installment in my lessons from the nativity series, where I'm sharing some activities I'm doing with my kids this Christmas season. We're talking about what we learn from different characters in the nativity story, then making ornaments to go along with what we discuss. I've included scriptures, songs, discussion questions, and step-by-step tutorials for making each ornament. Find them all here:  angel | star | manger | Baby Jesus***

A few years ago I had the idea to spend some time on each of the four Sundays before Christmas talking with our kids about what we can learn from each of the nativity characters. I don't mean learning about the Christmas story - the kids know the gist already - I mean what each of the characters can teach us. I choose one character per Sunday and we read the scriptures that mention him/her, then learn a song that features him/her, then talk about a lesson we can take from that character's portion of the story. We did this a few years ago and it was really fun, so I decided to to it again this year, with one addition: each Monday night we'll make an ornament representing the character we talked about on Sunday. This year we'll learn about the star, the angel, the manger, and Baby Jesus.

(Next year I'm planning to talk about Mary, Joseph, the shepherds, and the Wise Men. Then maybe I'll add a few more the year after that - and in a few years each child will have their own set of nativity ornaments they can save and use to teach their own kids!)

The Angel teaches us to SHARE the message/spirit of Christ

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