Christmas Crafts!

My goal this month has been to do a fun holiday project or craft each week with my daughter. There are so many AMAZING activities on Pinterest, but many of them were too much work for my brain to think about right now.  I wanted to do things that were easy prep, low mess and fast clean up.  So what have we done?  Here’s a look:

Cereal Christmas Trees

This was really easy to prep!  Everything I needed I had in the house.  I cut out the tree shape, trunk and star from construction paper(freehand).  I used craft scissors to cut the tree to give it a little pizzazz.  Then grabbed a handful of fruit loops for Isla (my daughter, 22 months) to glue on the tree like ornaments.  I put a dab of white glue on the tree and then she put a fruit loop on the glue.  It was a quick project to complete but she had a lot of fun!

Christmas Name Train

I picked up the foam train shape and foam stickers at the dollar tree.  We started with spelling out her name.  I gave her one letter at a time for her to place on the train.  We practiced saying the names and sounds of each letter while we were at it!  (Lots of fun to be had with those foam letters.)  Then she picked out the foam shapes she wanted, I peeled off the backing and she placed them where she wanted.  Both the shapes and the letters were sticky, so no glue mess to worry about.  We have a lot of leftovers so she can do this several times over!

Christmas Coloring Book

This counts right? ;)  I got this Christmas coloring book at the dollar tree. She really enjoyed coloring a few pages and then she was over it for the day.  But it’s a good sized coloring book so we have gotten it out quite a bit this month.  A quiet, non-messy, no prep activity is always welcome in this house!   

This was right before I had to run back around the table to keep her from spilling those candies all over the floor. 

Gingerbread Houses (Ok - not so easy prep, low mess, fast clean up but full of priceless memories!)

A family tradition!  Every year my family gets together to make gingerbread houses.  This was Isla’s first time making a gingerbread house.  My sister premade the houses so that they were ready to be decorated.  Every one brought candy and went to town decorating.  I put the frosting on for Isla and she picked out the candy and stuck it on her house.  She didn’t eat as much of the candy as I thought she would have, but I think that’s only because she tried one of those red oblong candies and then decided she didn’t want to try any more candy, haha!  If you are going to make gingerbread houses be sure to check out your local 99 cent store.  They have Christmas tree and Santa shaped gummies that are perfect for this project! 

So, that’s what we’ve been up to around here.  What projects/crafts are you doing with your little ones this time of year?  I’d love to hear about it!