Its the most wonderful time of the year! :) Indeed! Whats to not like - the spirit, the cheer, the music, the festivities, the dazzling lights, the carols playing on the radio all day long, the kids recognizing them from having sung them at school even if there parents just sung 'Jingle Bells' as kids themselves! Once again I am indeed thankful to the Lord for having given us an opportunity of experiencing a country and its culture firsthand.
So we thought of making cards for the kids' friends and teachers thanking them for touching our lives in the way they do. I browsed some absolutely wonderful blogs for some ideas and was amazed at how creative people are. Each idea was so wondrous and resulted in such beautiful products. It was so easy to get inspired and motivated. Unfortunately I do not exactly remember the blogs from which I got the idea for our Christmas cards (it was a mish mash of a couple of ideas) but I am putting up a link to another awesome blog which, in turn has links to many more interesting and awesome crafts, bloggers have done for Christmas.
We started out with using the clean side of used paper to make kids' handprints in red and green. We used Acrylic paints.
Followed it by letting them dry for a bit and then brushing a layer of glossy Mod Podge - my super favorite recent discovery and while it was still sticky, we sprinkled a generous dash of red, green and silver glitter.I don't have pictures for the remaining steps because we were knee deep in all the work but basically, I cut a triangle the size of the Christmas tree we wanted to place on our card and then cut it into strips careful to place them in order. The kids then glued the strips to the pre-prepared card cutouts (from white poster board) after they had drawn and colored the trunk with a brown crayon. I think a trunk made out of brown construction paper might have looked better but we didn't have any at hand. Nevertheless the end result was stunning. We also used cut strips to make borders and small cut squares to make gifts under the trees. I have to say that the cards look even better than they do in pictures because here the glossy finish isn't showing too well.
Also finally we collected our ceramic ornaments from the workshop we had enjoyed immensely at the Lillstreet Art Center. (Winter classes at Lillstreet Art Center begin January 9 and registration is open with a full schedule of classes available oniline at lillstreet.com. They offer classes in a wide range of mediums from metalsmithing to ceramics, photography to painting. Be sure to check them out.) And that proved to be the final straw for getting our very own Christmas tree :) Its a little silver one and only endorses the ornaments we are proud to have made ourselves even though they are far from perfect. I might just indulge in topping it with the very beautiful Christmas Tree Star I have my heart on but am not sure if I'll be able to find the time for it with a whole lot of play dates and busy social lives my kids feel they have a right to!
5 comments:
Loved it. Very nice Neera! You are so good at this! Must have taken so much time to do all this. Really nice. Kids feel so proud when they do these things.
Mod podge - I love it.
Lovely work with the cards & the tree. I am inspired to try the card technique :)
The visit was useful. Content was really very informative. visit giftwithlove dot com(portal to send gifts and flowers to India.).
noonoo - Yup I liked it so much when I saw it that I jumped into it with the kids without realizing the amount of time it would take :) J is pretty good with it - very patiently works on things and enjoys each step. V, after doing the hand prints step had to be called to finally write in them :D
Tulika: They are beautiful, aren't they? Do share pictures once you make them :)
noonoo: Long time, no post incidentally?! Post soon!
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