God's Christmas Promise Book Review

A few weeks ago the folks at DaySpring sent me a copy of  God's Christmas Promise which is a recordable story book that features the Christmas story.  We have been using this book to read the Christmas story at night.  I've been using it specifically with my oldest son and we have thoroughly enjoyed the book.

As I mentioned, you can record your own voice on each of the pages. The book comes preloaded with a narrator's voice.  We have been using that voice to read the story because I have been so swamped, I haven't had a chance to record my own voice reading the story.  I have read the directions on recording my voice and they are very straight forward, so I don't think that will be hard to do at all. My biggest issue is having a quiet minute to do the recording.  We have been on the go so much, even in the evenings.

I found the book to be a great, new way to have story time at night.  And I love it that after the holiday rush, I can sit down and record my voice so that in the future my kids can flip through the book and hear my voice reading the story.

The first night we read the book, my son Sawyer was tired.  But as soon as I opened the book and the narrator's voice started telling the story, he perked right up.  The book is well made and is made of a thick material, but is still light weight enough for a child to flip through the pages.  I also like the illustrations in the book. 

I would recommend this book and if you are still doing some Christmas shopping, I'd check it out and consider picking one up for yourself and/or as a gift. 

Hope you are having a great day in your neck of the woods!

Christmas Decorations 2011 - Part Two

I have felt limited in what I could do in the last few years with having small children. But this year I've been able to change things up a bit and that has made me so happy.  Before the holidays, I started seeing a lot of beautiful pins on Pinterest.  It really intrigued me that people had these over the top, gorgeous garlands used on mantels and what not.  I love the use of ribbon and mesh and decided I wanted to do that at my house.

One day I went to my local Ben Franklin and I was tickled to see they had the large mesh ribbon that I had seen on Pinterest.  I love the look of the lime green color that I've seen coming into Christmas decorations the last few years.  I think it adds a bright, whimsical look. And with having small children, I thought that would fit in great at our house.  So, I purchased red mesh and then got wide green ribbons to add.  I also bought red and green ting ting.  If you've never heard of that before, that is the sparkly twisted branches that florists use in arrangements.  I used that to tuck in my garlands, as well as my Christmas tree.

So, here is a picture of my garland going up the rail to go upstairs.  I decided to put our stockings there this year so that the boys wouldn't pull them down off the fireplace.  We have heavy nutcracker stocking holders and I didn't want the kids to get hurt, or break the holders. 

This picture is of my fireplace mantel.  As you can see, I have my nutcracker collection up there. I've run out of space for nutcrackers, so the collecting is done. 

The wire mesh is really wide.  To fashion it into the garland the way I wanted, I unrolled it a little at a time and then I bunched it into poofs (yes, that is a technical term - LOL) and held it in place with floral wire.  Floral wire is my best friend when Christmas decorating.  Once I got my wide mesh garland in place, I then went over it with a roll of the red and green ribbon.  I then had a wide roll of shiny ribbon that I would cut a piece out and fold in half to make it look like half a bow.  I then wired that into the center of where the poofs came together on the red mesh garland.  I also added that crazy bright green "rope".  That stuff was so much fun to work with. It came in a package with four strands.  I just started tucking it into my garland and it naturally would curl into loops. 

My final step to putting my garland together was to tuck the ting ting in. 

I know this looks very elaborate, but I'm telling you that you could do this too.  And the thing that was great about these supplies is I was able to do my fireplace mantel, the garland I picture above, as well as I adding some of these supplies to my Christmas tree and I still have some left over.  Most of the rolls came in 25 feet which went a long way. So for spending no more than $30 in supplies, I got a lot of bang for my buck.

I hope to post more pictures of my decorations, including my Christmas tree.  Hope you are having a great day in your neck of the woods.

Christmas Decorations 2011 - Part One

Bunco was so much fun last night and I got the final touches of decorating completed just in time.  I've been wanting to post pictures of my decorations, so today I thought I'd share a few pictures with you.  This will hopefully be a teaser so you'll come back and see the rest of the pictures I'll share. LOL

I do a lot of decorating for Christmas.  My husband has said he thinks our house looks its best at Christmas because I do so much.  It makes us all happy and makes our home feel welcoming.  It has made my heart happy to see my kids get excited about the decorations.  And sometimes a bit frustrated when they want to go behind mommy and redecorate.  But I'm trying to take it all in stride and I've learned to give them their own tree to decorate, and to set up a kids table that has things they can touch and move around.

So the first picture I wanted to show is the garland I have on the rail when you first walk in.  We have an open foyer.  A few years ago I bought gold Christmas lights at Kmart, the Martha Stewart lights.  So I have those in the garland. On a side note, I went to Kmart yesterday and I guess they aren't selling Martha Stewart anymore.  Bummer.  Now somewhere in the back of my mind I'm remember something about her having it out with Kmart a few year ago, but I obviously didn't remember that yesterday.  But I digress.

The big star in the picture below I just got at the craft show I attended the first of December.  The booth where I bought it had beautiful decorations and they were very reasonable.  I couldn't believe it, but the big star was only $12.  I really thought it would have been over $20.  I also got one small star that matches it.  It is an ornament on a tree in my dining room. I kicked myself after the craft show and wished I'd purchased more of the small ones.  They would have looked really great on garland too.  But I already have gold, shiny snowflakes on the garland, so I did have some bling.  I purchased those at Target.  They sell them every year and they come in different colors.  They have about 6 together and they are a dollar. I've found them to be a great, inexpensive way to add sparkle to your tree or garland. 

The next picture I wanted to share is my dining room table.  Because everything else in my decorating is bright, blingy, and flashy, I like to keep a very simple table scape.  Because my dining room table isn't huge, I find that doing a long arrangement is better than a wide.  That way I can still use my table for entertaining.   The two candle sticks that are on the far outsides of my display came in a kit and I got them for free last year when I purchased some things from Ulta.  I like how they are clear and chunky.  The other two glass pieces, the small hurricane and they taper candle stick are older Southern Living at Home pieces. I used to sell that and so those were some favorite pieces I had.  The greenery is real and are pieces from the bottom of our Christmas tree.  Every year my husband has to cut off some of the bottom branches to get it to fit in the stand, so I use the "scraps" in decorating. 

The two center pieces have real cranberries in them.  And as you can see I place a tea light on top of the cranberries.  On the table mixed in with the greenery I have some red Christmas ball picks.  They are so easy to tuck in the greenery.  I had some bits of ribbon left over, so I got some floral wire picks and wired the ribbon on them the sticks so I could tuck them in the greenery. 



If you don't have a large budget, you can still go from drab to fab. You can easily put something together for under $10 or even $20.   If you don't own any clear glass pieces, two places I'd recommend checking are Dollar Tree and Wal Mart.  They have very reasonably priced clear candle holders, hurricanes, and vases.  Cranberries, limes, lemons, and even nuts and dried beans (red and green) can look wonderful filling a glass container.  I've seen pretty martini glasses at Dollar Tree that would be perfect for filling with berries and tea lights, just as I did with my hurricane pictured above.

My final picture to share with you today is how I used  plant stand to display three faux chocolate Santas.  My plant stand is a tall pedestal and was a perfect way to decorate the corner of the dining room.  I'm also not using it for a plant right now, so that helped. LOL

I hope you've enjoyed seeing a peek at some of my Christmas decorations. I plan on doing another post to show you more.  Let me say that there will be lots of sparkly ribbon, and especially that mesh wire ribbon that has been all over Pinterest.  Hint, Hint. LOL

I hope you are having a great day in your neck of the woods.   And take time to slow down and enjoy the wonder that is the Christmas season.