A crafty Christmas…

I apologise for mentioning the c-word before it’s even December but I thought I’d show you what we have been up to on rainy days – and if you want to have a go yourself it needs a bit of time.

At the first session of  messy play we attended, Freya made some “art” in the form of a ladybird footprint. This got me thinking about other insects/animals we could make from baby feet at home so I joined Pinterest and, many, many hours later, had dozens of ideas.

When I came across the Christmas ones, I knew this was something we could do. As part of our bid to be more environmentally conscious we don’t send Christmas cards (we instead donate the money for the cards and postage to a charity each year) but I thought they would make nice presents from Freya for close family.

With the reindeer, my only problem was remembering how to make brown with primary colours – I’m seriously dreading when she gets homework, I will be attached to Google – but once that was done it was full steam ahead on the production line.

I think we might make being crafty at Christmas one of our traditions as, hopefully, she can get more involved, rather than just eating the paint, each year.

While we had some googly eyes spare, they work just as well if you draw them on.

This is not my first festive craft project – although it is the first one I can blame the amateur nature of them on a child (yay).

One year, when I had more time (and money), I bought organic cloth bags to put presents in rather than wrapping everything. I decorated each one by hand including learning how to cross stitch. I would suggest this is only a good idea if you have a few people to buy for. I think I did 10 in the end.

The year before that I bought brown parcel paper and drew Christmas trees and presents on it. This was not only cheaper than wrapping paper but easier to recycle. My husband’s grandmother liked it so much she kept it to resuse the following year.

Have you got any crafty ideas for Christmas? I’m always looking for new things to try.