Crafts and Activities

When I was growing up, we always went to my Grandma’s house in Vegreville on Boxing Day to celebrate Christmas with my aunt, uncles and cousins. There was a kid’s table and at each place setting there was a Christmas cracker so I associated them as part of the holidays and wanted them to be a tradition I incorporated into my own family someday.

When I was a young mom of two kids and The Husband was a student, we didn’t have an extra penny. We had moved back to our hometown to be closer to family when our baby was sick with kidney complications and The Husband had gone back to school. That year, I had worked hard making crafts to sell at a sale in our basement so that we would have money to buy food and a few gifts at Christmas so there was certainly no chance I could afford to buy Christmas crackers. I decided to make them.

I added a numbered strip of paper into each one that had a part of the Christmas story. When put in order, they told the story. I used scriptures from different gospels and pieced them together. At our Christmas Eve celebration that year, we all (adults too) opened our Christmas crackers and read our scripture verses in the right order to retell the story of Jesus’ birth.

This year, I slipped strips of paper into the crackers that all said the same thing. “For unto us a Child is born.”-Isaiah 9:6

To make the crackers, you need:

• empty toilet paper rolls
• tissue paper
• small toys or candy
• paper
• ribbon, tape or string

Fill the empty toilet paper roll with candy or little toys or trinkets. I used to also make crowns out of tissue paper and fold them tightly to fit them in just like a store bought Christmas cracker. Slip your paper with the scripture verse or encouragement in.

Roll the cardboard tube in tissue paper. Secure the ends by tying ribbon (or tape or string) at the ends of the roll, leaving some tissue paper sticking out each end. Decorate using ribbon. You can also curl the ends of the ribbon using scissors.

Sometimes the most obvious answer is right in front of you. If you look closely at the picture of the single Christmas cracker, you may notice that the decorative strip around it is made of tin foil. I cut a thin strip of tin foil, wrapped it around to decorate and secured it with a glue stick. My friend Christie was here at the time and gently pointed out that I could always just use ribbon which would be much easier! I decorated the rest using ribbon! I tell you this only to say that if you didn’t have ribbon and wanted to add some flair to your crackers, you could use tin foil.

I remember making these ornaments with my grandma one year when I was about 9. They are easy to make but younger children will need an adult to do the sewing part for them. One of the things I like about them is that they really allow for creativity. They can be simple or you can pull out the glitter glue and embellishments and let your kids go to town!

materials needed:

felt pieces
scissors
string or yarn
glue
sewing needle
optional: embellishments such as glitter glue, sequins, buttons, faux fur, foam shapes, stickers

Trace the shape of a stocking onto a piece of paper and cut it out. Lay the cutout onto the piece of felt and trace two of the stockings with a marker or chalk. Cut them both out.

Lay the pieces of felt together so that the marker outline is on the inside (not visible). Starting at the top of the stocking, sew down around the stocking and up the other side, leaving an opening across the top.

We tried to do the sewing with a plastic needle so that the younger kids could sew theirs, but it was too difficult to get through the two layers of felt so we used metal sewing needles. The older kids sewed their own (the ones pictured above) and we sewed for the younger kids.

The kids cut shapes out of the scraps of felt remaining (in the other colour) to add some flair to their stockings. I didn’t give them any instruction for this bit and just let them create. I also set out some faux fur that some of them added to their ornaments. Some of the kids chose to add a loop to the top of theirs to hang on the tree while others chose to keep it as a cute mini stocking without adding a loop. These crafts are actually quite sweet!

When I was growing up, my fondest memories of holiday preparations was making our Rice Krispie houses. We made them for as long as I can remember. There were one or two years when we tried making gingerbread houses but they were flops. One year, our icing wasn’t right and the pieces of the house wouldn’t stick together. Another, the gingerbread broke into tiny pieces when we were trying to assemble it so by the time I had my own family, I didn’t even attempt gingerbread and stuck with what I knew would work.

Rice Krispie houses are easy to make and as an added bonus, as long as you use gluten free Rice Krispies, you can make these gluten free. Some years, we make one large house while other years, each of the kids make their own. One year for Miss Optimism’s December birthday, all the party guests made their own candy house to take home.

To begin, cover a cardboard base with tin foil. Next, make a batch of Rice Krispie square base. (To make these six houses, I had to make 2 batches.)

Melt 1/2 cup butter or margarine with 5 1/2 cups mini marshmallows. You can do this in the microwave or on the stovetop. Stir in 6 cups of Rice Krispies cereal (regular or gluten free). While the mixture is still warm, drop it onto the prepared cardboard bases.

Have the kids shape into the desired shape. This can be the shape of a house or an igloo or a snowman or anything else their imagination comes up with. We usually also shape a small amount of the Rice Krispie mixture into a tree for the yard.

Next, cover the structure and the base with white icing. You can use store bought icing or make your own. We made a simple butter, icing sugar and milk icing. We make a small amount of green icing for the trees.

Next comes the really fun part…decorating the houses with candy. There are no rules or instructions for this part. I like to buy the mint chocolate square wafers because they make good shingles for the roof or shutters or doors. I try to provide an assortment of candies so that they can create whatever they want. (two mini candy canes and a chocolate mint wafer makes a good Santa sleigh!)

To finish off the cute little houses, sprinkle a little bit of icing sugar on top for the look of snow. And then of course there is the eating! Our kids certainly were happy to have their own candy houses to eat.

What are your Christmas traditions? I love this list of Christmas traditions shared by another family.

Have you ever wondered what to do with the stack of old Christmas cards you have? These ornaments are the perfect solution!

We make these every couple of years. This craft is easy enough for the kids to do but the ornaments are nice enough to give as gifts.

I like to wait until I have a fairly large pile of cards to choose from so that I can match up colours or designs that I think will go nicely together, but even four or five cards is enough to create one of these ornaments.

When I first started making these, I used to trace circles using a glass and pencil on the back of the cards and then cut them out by hand.

Thankfully, there are now tools that can be used to make cutting the circles much faster! There are now circle cutters and circle punches that make cutting circles a breeze! I used a circle cutter from my scrapbooking days.

How to Make Christmas Card Ornaments

Materials needed:

• greeting cards
• glue sticks
• hole punch
• ribbon or string
• scissors or a circle cutter

Instructions:

1. Start by cutting 20 circles.
2. Next, fold each circle into a triangle, creating three sides.
3. Glue the side of one with the side of another in groupings of five, eventually creating a sphere.
4. Next, decide where you want the top of the ornament to be and hole punch at the top. Thread a ribbon through and your ornament is complete!

You can cut randomly or pre-plan based on colour, pattern or picture. I grouped mine so that we could make one with blues, one with whites and silver, one with reds, one with puppies, one with pine cones and several of the word “Peace”, and one with geometric shapes and sharp contrasts. If you have several of the same card, you can also create really interesting patterns with them.

You can often find pictures on the back or inside of the card that work well so don’t forget to check there!

It’s fun for the kids to see their 3D circle start to take shape.

Each one is unique because of the different patterns and colours on the greeting cards. 

Making holiday ornaments using recycled materials is inexpensive and fun.