Ornaments

Last 2013 Christmas post (I think)....

Can't forget about the little cinnamon ornaments we made for gifts this year!

I got the idea from one of the mommy blogs I read.

I'm a follower of three mommy blogs:  For the Mommas, Money Saving Mom, and Passionate Penny Pincher.  While I'll be forever loyal to For the Mommas, as it's where I learned to coupon, which saves us on average $250 a month, my favorite Mommy (couponing/money saving blog these days has to be Passionate Penny Pincher.

I like it for several reasons.

First, I read it for the weekly menu plan, which the author posts on Mondays. It includes coupon match-ups and store deals for the week.  I also love it for the recipes she shares, especially the super easy ones, many of which involve Mrs. Potts, her beloved slow cooker, who she even takes with her on vacation (I'm pretty sure if this lady lived in my neck of the woods, we'd be fast friends.)

And, of course, I love the "daily deals" she shares, some of which saved us a great deal on Christmas this year and made for some unique ideas I wouldn't have otherwise considered.  You wouldn't believe how many freebies & great deals there are out there-how any of these bloggers keep up with them, much less find time to link them into their blogs, I'll never know. I'm just happy they do.

There are a ton of Mommy money saving/crazy couponing blogs out there (KrazyCouponLady and SouthernSavers among them), but what really sets Passionate Penny Pincher apart is how real she is, sharing her trials as well as triumphs.  Like this posting she did on Grace just a few days before Christmas.

Now, this lady lives in Alabama, and I wouldn't recognize her if she was in front of me in line at the grocery store. Though I think maybe I would. She'd be fiddling through her coupons like me; no, she'd already have hers pulled.

I do feel like I sorta know her, though, as I can certainly relate to much of the stuff she shares. She's a stay at home mother of three (they're all stay at home moms- who else would have time to read sales and match up coupons), who is passionate about saving money but also about giving back- half the proceeds from her blog goes to missions.  You can read her story here.

Ok, enough about the blogs I read and onto the reason I'm even mentioning them- it's where I got the idea for the topic of this post- the cinnamon ornaments Anabella and Daniel made to give as gifts this year.

Yep, you guessed it's from the Passionate Penny Pincher- another reason I love her blog- the Friday Fluff Up (frugal ways to "fluff up").  This lady likes Dollar Tree more than me. Can it be?

Here's the link to her posting for these ornaments- it was a Friday Fluff-Up Penny Pinched Christmas Projects.

While our finished products are far from Passionate Penny Pincher's pinterest worthy cinnamon ornaments- I love ours, nonetheless.

Here's what we did:

Step 1: Following the recipe:

Ingredients

1. 1 cup of Cinnamon Aldi’s has a good sized bottle for $1 ~ love that!)
2. 3/4 cup of Applesauce
3. 2 tablespoons Regular Elmer’s School glue

Directions

1. Mix ingredients together — until its like a cookie dough. (If its too dry you can add more applesauce, if its too wet add more cinnamon.)
2. Mix in your school glue. (I sprinkle cinnamon on my counters -(like I would flour) and roll out with a rolling pin.)
3. You’ll want your ‘dough’ sort of thick but not too too thick.
4. Cut out with your favorite cookie cutter. We use Gingerbread men — also make a small whole at the top — so you can run ribbon or a ornament hanger through to hang on your tree.
5. Place on a cooling rack and dry about 48 hours — then paint them (if you’d like!) or leave them plain. (We leave ours plain.)  You can also dry them in a food dehydrator for about 8 hours if you have one -to cut down on drying time.

They each took a turn helping pour in the ingredients.

Do you see the spoons they're nibbling on-  I suppose they thought they were going to stir this thick gooey mess with those teaspoon sized spoons.

Mommy stirred.
It happened to be a snow day (hence, the pjs), so Daddy was home and took pictures.

Meanwhile, Michael was hanging out near the window in hopes he'd see some of the familiar white stuff he was used to in the North Pole.

Step 2: Rolling the Dough

While I had prepared the surface by sprinkling it with cinnamon as suggested in the recipe, it didn't say anything about preparing the rolling pin.  Oops.

Step 3:  Cutting out the ornaments

Once we got the glop off the rolling pin, and were actually able to flatten it to begin using the cutters, the rest was pretty easy.

The dough was thick and durable and easy for little hands- they needed just a little assistance pulling it out, but mostly they did it themselves.

Step 4:  Admiring our work and waiting for it to dry 

Look at all the snow!
Michael: Snow? What snow?

Step 5:  Three Days Later:  Painting the ornaments

Anabella's first ornament

Daniel's first ornament

I read somewhere that Q-tips are good for kids to use when painting.
For someone who doesn't like to dip more than once before discarding, yes, I'd say Q-tips are the way to go.  Any guesses whose towel this might be? And, do you know every bit of paint came out of that old towel.  Gotta love washable paint! Especially since it ends up in a lot of "other" places besides the towel.. 

Step 6: (why did I think this would be a simple project?) Painting the back of the ornaments:

They took early baths that evening before dinner.  It was Daniel's idea to pull chairs to the countertop where I had the ornaments on the drying rack. Turned out to be a pretty good one.  They stood and finished painting. After baths, did I mention that? Do you see why I do not make money from my blogging like Passionate Penny Pincher?   Nowhere in the recipe does it include a 6th step- painting ornaments while standing on chairs AFTER baths. 

Dan told me he was painting the trees green "because trees are green." 

Step 7:  Making tags for the ornaments

Now why I didn't at first think to just write their names on their ornaments with a Sharpie along with the date, which is what I eventually did, I don't know.  That would have been too easy, I suppose.

No, instead, I tried to weave through this tiny piece of string that came along with these cute little gift tags I had picked up early in the season at IKEA. It was a complete impulse buy (not like me at all), and while I wasn't using them on gifts (they didn't match any paper or bags), I really needed to find a use for them.

So, I figured I'd have the kids personalize them (not taking into consideration that they were smaller than their little hands) and then I'd hang them on each ornament.

Anabella, eager to please, complies with most anything her Mommy suggests.

Daniel, meanwhile, did not take much interest in this little creative project leaving me with one "personalized" gift tag and a whole slew of ornaments. Not to mention the tag was bigger than the ornament, and I was making myself crazy trying to get that tiny string through, and having even less luck tying the knot to keep it in place. I hope my children have better fine motor skills than their mother.

Step 8:  Preparing the wrapping paper

LaRue found this cute wrapping paper that was made for children to color.  So, while I was executing plan B for the tagging (writing their names with sharpies and inserting real ornament hooks into the holes following my unfortunate previous attempt at threading through the string), Anabella and Daniel colored the paper they would use to wrap the ornaments.

Dan eventually bought into this, but not before attempting to turn his paper into an airplane first.
He relented when he realized I really wasn't kidding when I told him that, unlike Daddy, I really didn't know the first thing about making airplanes.  

Step 9:  Adding the gift tags (hurray, I found a use!) and placing them under the tree

Man, oh man, I tell you what, next year we're going back to the plain ol' personalized paintings as presents- remember last year's "special gifts."

Either that, or we start in May.

No, really. While this posting makes it seems a little long and drawn out, it was a project full of memories, both in the making and hopefully for years to come .

How long do you think that cinnamon will keep its aroma?  Huh, what aroma, we covered it in paint!