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This is the cutest idea – from Family Fun magazine. Starting in December, take enough Christmas books to read one each night until Christmas, but there’s a twist…wrap them up! Let your child pick one each night to unwrap and read. If you don’t have enough Christmas books of your own, borrow some from your public library. Awwww…. this makes me wish I still had little ones to read to!
We’re leaving on a jet plane tomorrow morning to warmer parts for Christmas holidays. We’ll be staying in Puerto Vallarta for a week, and then heading about 45 min up the coast to the town of Sayulita for two more. I’m told we have wireless in the hotel and at the rental house, so I’ll be bringing my laptop and checking in now and then. Posting on Gold River Buzz won’t be as regular, but I will try to write here and there. (In between margaritas of course!) Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all!
At ICaughtSanta.com, you can upload a picture of your very own living room, then pick one of their many Santa poses and add him into your photo. You are able to adjust the Santa photo (the colour, brightness, position, etc) and once you’re satisfied, you can then download, email or print your photo. The service costs $9.99, but well worth it in my opinion to see the wonder of your child’s face when you tell the story of waking up in the middle of the night, hearing something strange in the living room and catching Santa in the act of delivering his gifts! It’s not only Santa either – you can catch the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy and Cupid too!
I’ve been involved in a few of these in the past and they’re always fun and a great way to get a variety of baking without doing all the work! If anyone’s interested in doing this, please let me know. I wouldn’t mind spearheading this, but we will be away for the holidays this year so I won’t be able to. It wouldn’t take much – just keep track of the numbers and give everyone a date to meet. It can be as simple or as festive as you’d like! There are literally hundreds of resources on the web to get you started from The Rules of the Cookie Exchange, to Cookie Exchange Invitations and Christmas cookie recipe sites like RecipeGirl, JoyofBaking and All-Time Favourite Christmas Cookies. Anyone interested? Email me (info/at/goldriverbuzz.com) or comment on this post and I’ll do my best to get everyone together before we leave. In December 2003, we’d been living in Gold River for a few months, and really didn’t know all that many people yet. So imagine our surprise when on the morning of December 14th, we opened our front door and found something crazy sitting on the porch. It was a little tree, with tiny plastic pears and a fake bird in it. There was a note attached which read, “On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me: a partridge in a pear tree.” This was SO much fun for the four of us – we even ended up getting a tad too enthusiastic. Some mornings we were pushing and shoving to be the first one to open the front door! It was also loads of laughs for the two Secret Santa’s as well. (who we didn’t unearth until months later) I saved the note cards and wrote what we received on the back, always meaning to do this for one of my neighbours, but I just never managed to get organized in time. Here’s how the rest of it goes if you’d like to play Secret Santa: On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me: A partridge in a pear tree. As I said, we received a little tree (a branch really) complete with fake pears and partridge. On the second day…….. Two Turtle Doves: On the third day……. Three French Fries On the fourth day….. four minutes of calling. On the fifth day……. five golden wine rings. On the sixth day……. six geese a-laying eggs On the seventh day…… seven ugly ducklings On the eighth day……. eight maids a-milking On the ninth day…… nine ladies ‘Dirty Dancing’ On the tenth day…… ten frogs a-leaping On the eleventh day…… eleven licorice pipes On the twelfth day…… twelve drummers drumming What you decide to give and do is really only limited by your imagination and your budget. Sneaking around your neighbourhood unseen in the middle of the night is compulsory as well! John McCrae’s famous poem arranged into a song by Adele Simmons.
Maybe it’s just me, but most of those costumes (some they even called ‘Junior’ costumes) looked like something you would wear in the privacy of your own bedroom rather than what you’d put on your teenage daughter! (I know, I know – I sound all old and uptight, don’t I?) The point I wanted to make was that out of all the costumes we ordered (which looked fantastic online, btw), only ONE was actually decent, and remotely resembled the advertised picture.  Look! You could be Balloon Boy! This year I told my two to forget it – I wasn’t wasting any more money online on costumes. I expected some complaining, but they obviously know that Mum means business (haha), so they quickly went about finding other options. Daughter #1 begged, borrowed and stole a costume from a friend, and daughter #2 paid $5 for a Batman costume. Go ahead, laugh if you will at a teenage girl wearing a Batman costume, but it’s my favourite costume ever. She is covered FROM HEAD TO TOE in cheap black polyester! L-O-V-E it! If your child doesn’t want to beg, borrow, steal or dress as Batman, a great place to check for ideas is the Family Fun website. I have loved this site for years and even though my two are now way past this stage, I still buy the magazine and pour over the website – remembering and longing for the days when they were little girls with their crafts and crayons. :-( (sniff, sniff) Wow – this was a long, sad post when all I meant to do was tell you about costumes at Family Fun. This must be how nature prepares us for Grandchildren….
There are oodles of stencils you can use for your pumpkin (as a quick Google will show), but I happened to run across stencils for your favourite dog breed, and thought it was worth sharing. You can find these free dog breed pumpkin stencils at the Better Homes & For all stencils, start by cleaning out the pumpkin, scraping the flesh thinnest in the region in which you’ll carve the design. Attach the pattern (enlarged on a photocopier) to the pumpkin with tape. Use a pin to make closely spaced pin pricks along the stencil lines, piercing the paper. Remove the pattern. Cut completely through solid lines (as shown on the stencil), but only peel away the skin within the dotted lines to enhance features. Check out all the different stencils – have fun and be creative! |
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