"Hand Made" Fun

With our first real snow this morning, it IS beginning to feel like Christmas.  As Thanksgiving approaches, the hustle and bustle of the holiday season always sneaks up on me and goes by way too fast.  I try my best every year to get as much done as I can before Thanksgiving, but even so, it still seems like there is not enough time in the day to do all I want to. 

During the month of November, I always make a point to make and finish our "Hand Made" Ornaments for our homemade Christmas tree.  Ever since our daughter was a baby I have created hand/foot print ornaments.  It is fun to see how big both kids hands and feet have gotten.  This is the first year their hands have been too big to combine in a joint ornament.  I think next year I may have to use thumb prints to keep the ornaments at a manageable size.  Here is a Studio J layout I created talking about our tradition. 

Drum roll.....here is this year's ornament.....SANTA!  I saw an adorable porcelain hand print ornament similar to this and just adapted it to paper and to my kids' hands.  Aren't they adorable?  I am tickled with how they turned out.

 The hats noses and mustaches are just paper pieced on. The kids helped me put on the eyes and added the fluffy paint to Santa's Hat.  To make fluffy paint, simply combine equal parts shaving cream and Elmer's glue.  I let the kids use their fingers to decorate.  When the paint dries it has a spongy consistency and looks and feels pretty cool.  Would be great for a snow scene painting too. 

Here's to the first of many holiday posts!  Happy Crafting!

~Amy