Simple Advent Calendar for Children

Christmas may be over, but there were some cool projects that got done.  The first was an Advent calendar of sorts for my youngest nieces.  I used the leftover Christmas cards that their daddy had sent; they became the fronts of the little boxes. Then I made some small 'ornaments' from some photos, found a miniature creche set, included candies and some other small items.

The girls loved the calendar, and my brother-in-law was pleased that his cards had been used.  Again.

I will be mother of the groom.

My husband is 1/2 Danish, and when we got married, he asked an aunt to make a kronsekake, or Danish wedding cake.  She did and the result was lovely.

Now that my son is engaged, I tried my hand at making a kronsekake of my own. (We pronounce this word as kon' see kie.)  The recipe is tasty, using mostly egg yolks, confectioner's sugar, lots of flour and almond paste.  I had to use special forms to create the 18 separate rings, but I was quite pleased with the effort.

Cool Crafts.

My son's fiancee brought a beautiful handmade portfolio from her mom.  She had used a pattern and sprayed adhesive to attach the fabric inside and outside.  The stationery is Christmas themed, but I plan to use it at my desk to hold loose birthday/wedding/sympathy cards.

I LOVE this!  I can see me doing something similar for my sisters.

But the ornaments don't match the theme!

Have you ever wanted to put the "special" ornaments on the tree, but they don't quite go with the color scheme you are trying to achieve?  My sister, Jane, has a white and gold tree every year; she also had some ornaments that were very dear to her but didn't go with the tree.  So she did this instead:

Old window with precious ornaments

She already had the frame.  Jane is an avid quilter and at one time was going to put quilt squares in the panes to achieve a stained glass effect.  But the squares never got made, and here she was with a dilemma.  One of the ornaments is from her daughter who had been in boot camp at the time.  This space is at a turn in her staircase, and usually has her birdhouse collection.  But she covered the birdhouses with a piece of white felt (making it look like snow to me!) and voila! A perfect vignette.

Just starting out

I wanted a place to bring all those lovely things that I found, and specifically because my sister Jane is so beautifully gifted with crafts.  She loves the primitive style and can do just about anything she sets her mind to. So I want to start with the chicken feed bag she made for me.
Jane has a friend who raises chickens and who gives her the feed bags.  They are very sturdy, and Jane uses them for the mail and office work.  I plan to use mine as a grocery bag.  The bag said "50 lbs" so it had that much feed in it, and I tested the handles by putting a 17 pound turkey (I am thawing one for the holidays) into the bag.  The handles 'handled' the weight without strain.

Front

This is the back

 The bag is large, about 18" tall and 16" wide and the pleated sides will enable it to hold quite a few groceries.