zen crafting

I am loving my holiday tree.

 I love thinking of all the possibilities.

Even more than that,

I love seeing if I can create it without 

going to the store for ANYTHING.

A fun challenge indeed.

so I get ornament hooks from the Christmas box...

and bright pink satin from my sewing scrap bag...

and little pearls and rhinestones from the bead box...

and I rip the pages out of thrashed, old books....

and I fold those papers in half and cut out little hearts...

you know, old school style,

like a second grader.

and I play around with punches...

and I start cutting hearts out of the satin too...

and I grab my trusty glue gun...

and totally immerse myself in all of it...

and I listen to piles of  David Sides...

and the hum of the baby monitor...

and the occasional bark of a neighborhood dog...

And all feels right with the world.

So, I call it zen crafting.

Because it is THAT good.

Holiday Tree/Bucket List Hybrid Thing-y

My friend Kristen has one of these, and even though the hubs has deemed it "creepy-cute," I think it is brilliant! She uses hers to celebrate not only Christmas, but Valentine's Day, Halloween, and other fun holidays as well. I LOVE this idea because it is simple, and the tree branches are, {drum roll please} FREE!

{Oh how I love free}

The other thing I love about this idea is that it keeps your holiday decorations to a minimum. You could have a small box {Like, shoe-box size or smaller}with decorations for each little holiday and store them on a shelf in a hall closet. Your kids will love decorating it with each new holiday's ornaments and your home will remain reasonably uncluttered.

HOW TO MAKE ONE:

I put this one together with:

a branch from my backyard

white spray paint

some sparkly ornaments  

{I got tiny ones at the Target Dollar Spot and glued glitter to them. 16 ornaments for $1 - can't beat that!}

rice {to stick the branch end into} 

a bunch of random ribbons from my ribbon drawer

and some scrapbooking tags with hand cut embellishments. 

I have also done gone made mine into a "Bucket List Tree" Hybrid thing-y. {Yep.}

I thought it would be fun to fuse the two. So, I labeled the little tag ornaments with bucket list activities and now Kort pulls a tag out of the base, reads the activity, we go and do it, then we hang the tag on the tree as a reminder of the fun we've had together.

It's all very special.