*&*&*&*&*&* Nearly December - Christmas starts here *&*&*&*&*&*

[FrannyandZooey]

Is anyone else really foolishly excited? I just can't wait to start making glittery cards, baking biscuits, get the tree and lights up, carol services, parties, and I have been holding back till Dec 1st to begin

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH I am sooooooooooo excited

i really cant wait but will have awful fun keeping a toddler and a crawling baby away from my xmas tree lol

Blimey no .... still feels like October to me .... ... I'm so disorganised !!

Does anyone else do an advent present on 1st December as well as a calendar? This is a really sad tradition that I have invented. Dp doesn't approve I don't think

I love Christmas , I can't waitto putthe tree up but dd1 wants us to wait til after her b'day.

Advent calenders are up on wall but wont get excited till tree up and dont put it up till 12th/13th. 2 weeks of hyper children is more than enough! CAnt believe that some people have had theirs up for weeks!!!

Oh poo! I've forgotten to buy an advent calendar.

Got Advent calendars out tonight. Have 3! One nice tasteful one for me, Playmobile one to annoy DH as we put it together and a choccie one for DS.

So now am feeling Xmassy!

Off to London tomorrow for weekend and taking DS to see Santa in Selfridges tomorrow.

God I can't wait, I bought mini Christmas cookie cutters today

I just wish I had thought through the full implications for Christmas card making, when deciding on a punishment for ds for drawing on the walls

I said he can not use any pens or pencils for a week which could make creating a masterpiece for Grandma quiet tricky

Hmm. He doesn't in fact know the days of the week very accurately....

What are you going to do on your cards Frannyandzooey ?
Go on, inspire me please!

ooh I must go to bed

I will tell all tomorrow

ohhh cant believe it is dec soon..we got Ds a playmobil calender this year so am looking forward to setting that up with him.

What is this playmobil calendar you're all on about?

ledodgy they are like make a scene calenders will try to find link. I got mine brand new for £7 on ebay

ledodgy they are like make a scene calenders will try to find link. I got mine brand new for £7 on ebay

here all more expensive now though. I got ours about 6wks ago.

And my Christmas name is here!

Still feel like am going to die though.

Yay got the advent calenders up , starting to feel more Xmassy

oh god.

Am usually disproportionately excited at this stage but this year i really can't get myself excited.

Am going to have the minimum of decs, just for dd really.

REALLY can't be arsed with it all.

Not doing cards this year.

Just call me Scrooge.

Ooooooooooh it is here

ds very pleased indeed with his advent calendar and present, although I was disappointed with quality of latest Charlie and Lola story...

Mrsnoah I am being quite lazy and uncreative this year but I am doing this on quite a large scale at my 2 toddler groups, with a wide age range, so wanted to do some cards that looked effective but simple (and as little mess as possible)

We have got some Christmas ink stamps to do with silver ink on black paper, and some of those skeleton leaves coloured gold, to stick on red and green paper. You can get the leaves from eBay and the Range is a good place for stamps and blank cards.

We're also making tree decs from air dry clay and painting them (just let the child mould any shape and make a hole in the top to put some gold thread through), calendars, crowns and spiral decs (all pre cut and pre printed from Baker Ross - pricey but very easy ). Oh and reindeer food! (cellophane bags from eBay, mix oats and glitter and attach a luggage style tag explaining that the reindeer will find their way to your garden by following the glittery light )

Last year we were a bit more ambitious and did green marbling with little dashes of colour, then cut out a tree shape and mounted on card. Stick a small glittery pompom on the top and that really looked fab, but lots of mess. We also did collage snowmen - cut out the parts of this body, nose, wiggle eyes etc in advance and let the child assemble it. Add snowflake sequins - looks good on black card.

Wow Franny I am so impressed.

Today is sunday and I am running a christmas workshop for 20 kids.(although am bleary eyed as ds allowed me 4.5hrs sleeplast night)
Making pressies for their long suffering mums today!

We too are making xmas tree decs, but out of sugar icing, did this before and they do eat most of it so decs end up quite smaller than planned

Love the reindeer food idea..sweet!

I find Baker Ross really pricey and they always let me down on delivery being late. Where else do you recommend?

F&Z you buy the bags for reindeer food?I have spent all weekend cutting circles out of cellophane to make packets!