The Secret to Life's Happiness is Baked Doughnuts

Because doesn't this just look like perfection?

Willow has made the baked doughnuts from Knead It, Punch It, Bake It!: The Ultimate Breadmaking Book for Parents and Kids a few times now, and every time I swear they turn out tastier! This time we refrigerated the dough overnight before rolling it out, simply because Willow ran out of time to finish that evening, and I do believe that it made the dough much easier to work with--less sticky, easier to cut, etc.

But of course, who cares about the baking instructions? Everybody knows that the real treat is dunking them in melted butter, rolling them in cinnamon-sugar--

--and munching them up while they're still warm:

Fabulous, yes?

Even better that they're made by the seven-year-old.

Tutorial: Popsicle Stick Christmas Ornaments (or Wands!)

When the holidays become most bustling--to and fro to winter gymnastics camp, to and fro to playdates with schooled children who are temporarily out of school, to and fro for last-minute bits and bobbles, to and fro to the library to appease the child who CANNOT take a major car trip without several dozen novels, back to gymnastics camp for the winter show, shitfire we have to make one more trip to the grocery store for cookie dough and oranges, not to mention, you know, the TEN-HOUR car trip--that, to me, at least, is when simple Christmas crafts are the most magical. Everyone settles down, everyone slows down, everyone relaxes back into the home and back into the process, not the product, of the winter holidays.

While, due to the bustling, some of our most favorite Christmas crafts, such as baking cherry bread with Daddy and decorating gingerbread houses with me, have actually been relegated to post-road trip New Year's activities, we made the time every day to come together for some simple special activities every day, such as these painted and glittered popsicle stick ornaments.

To start, you'll need plain popsicle sticks and glue--yes, you can use plain white glue for these, but you'll have to let them dry for several hours before you paint if you do, and if you use hot glue, you'll be painting five minutes later. A Star of David is two triangles--

 --with one upside-down and on top of the other:

A tree is one triangle and one stick--

--placed vertically from top to bottom:

Of course, after an ornament or two, the girls were done with that nonsense and fully focused on popsicle stick wand-making. This is why we only have a half-dressed tree at the best of times.

After the glue is dry on the popsicle stick creations, paint them--

--and then, while the paint is still wet, sprinkle the glitter right on:


Wait, did I say sprinkle? I meant douse. Liberally.

When the paint is dry, hang up your obligatory two ornaments onto the tree, and then spend the rest of the evening wielding your wand:

She was turning me into something not very complimentary, alas, on account of I had just told her that it was time for bed. Such is life for a young wizard...

Candy Christmas Trees

We're doing gingerbread houses just as a family this year, so in lieu of last year's larger gingerbread house party (which was well worth it, as everyone had a fabulous time, but did require me to pre-bake and assemble a half-dozen gingerbread houses), this year the girls had over a little buddy and his mama (my buddy) to make far simpler candy Christmas trees.

The Christmas trees really are quite simple, requiring only waffle cones that Willow trimmed with kitchen scissors to sit evenly upside down, green frosting (I used white chocolate melted in our fondue pot and dyed green, similarly to what I do with gingerbread houses, but I quickly realized when the kids all got to work that this was major overkill), and loads of yummies.

They were messy--

--a little ugly (and yes, of course, that's mine below that I'm calling ugly)--

--and absolutely wonderful.

Beeswax Ornaments: Honey on the Tree

For a couple of days it seemed the crafts-only crock pot was always hot, keeping beeswax melty, spreading that honey scent throughout the entire house, while we all took our turns (many turns!) making beeswax ornaments for our Christmas tree, and the trees of our family and friends.

So simple, so satisfying, so sweet(!) to make:

To make your own, check out my beeswax and fabric scrap ornament tutorial over at Crafting a Green World.

Caution!!! Elves at Work!

with beeswax

and silicon molds

fabric scraps

and a sewing machine

bias tape

and waffle cones

red and green M&Ms

and cardstock

kite paper

and glue

a guillotine paper cutter

and FIMO clay

Photoshop

and digital scrapbook supplies

Sharpies

and, of course, a well-used box of

Christmas is busily, happily, (and quite inefficiently) being crafted. And photographed, and written about, of course--but not for now! Everyone knows that Christmas craft revelations have to come AFTER Christmas!

Beeswax Paper in Bee Culture Magazine

One of my favorite things about writing for Crafting a Green World is the fact that I retain ownership of my own work. That means that when the editor of Bee Culture magazine, having seen my beeswax paper tutorial posted at Crafting a Green World, writes me to ask if I could submit that tutorial to their magazine for publication, I may say yes!

I wish that getting my work in print was ALWAYS this easy!

P.S. Want to follow along with my craft projects, books I'm reading, dog-walking mishaps, and other various adventures on the daily? Find me on my Craft Knife Facebook page!

On Horseback

I have a mental list of practical skills that are, while not actually so much practical in the strictest sense of the word, are nonetheless skills that are, rather, useful to have, since they involve activities that we may be called upon to participate in off and on throughout our lives on a casual basis, and that can also be quite dangerous if we participate without knowing what the hell we're doing.

Short and incomplete list:

• lighting a bonfire, fireplace, or grill
• swimming
• ice skating
• shooting a rifle or pistol
• using a chain saw, wood chipper, or other large power tool
• driving a stick shift
• steering a boat
• horseback riding
• using a pocket knife

Sure, ice skating is more merely painful, and absolutely no fun, if the first time you've ever been on the ice is in a group outing with some of your buddies from college, but I know of plenty of idiots who got themselves seriously injured because they didn't know how to light a fire properly (hint: it doesn't involve a Dixie Cup full of gasoline), and I know of one wonderful child who was killed his first time on horseback, on a poorly-run, unsafe trail ride at a state park in Missouri that his parents didn't realize was unsafe because they were unfamiliar with horses, too.

But forget the fear-mongering--call my list, instead, a life skills bucket list, or a list of accomplishments for the well-rounded person. Whatever you call it, and lengthy intro aside, what I am wanting to tell you is that my little girls were basically living the dream last Friday:

First horseback riding lesson? Mark it off the bucket list, and you might as well just go ahead and skip Christmas after that, because it does not even compare.

The girls' horseback riding class at PALS featured a well-fitted helmet that each child wore at all times when around the horse (not just when upon it)--

--and a dedicated side-walker for each child, and a second walker holding a lead rope:

In addition, since PALS is primarily a riding-therapy program for people with special needs, the horses are invariably, calm, kind, patient, and well-trained. The absolute only thing that I had issue with is that they didn't require students to wear a heeled boot (just a closed-toe shoe), but I put my kids in heeled boots anyway, so no problem.

The girlies learned how to mount their horses, how to start them walking (with Willow's lazy horse Splash, this involved a big kick!), how to hold the reins and balance-- 

--how to steer--

--how to stop--


--how to hang on when they work up a little speed--


--how to take off their tack and groom them and make them comfy--

--how to talk about them using all the right words, croup and forelock and barrel and such--

--how to wait patiently, still and quiet--

--and how to put away all their tack and gear in just the right place, even if it's REALLY heavy:

Along with always looking out for things that I want the kiddos to know, I'm always looking out for sports and activities that have value for building them into the types of people that they'll want to be.

Forget the discipline, patience, affinity with another creature, willingness to grub and muck stuff that are of such value--it took a total of one lesson before the girls informed that they want to grow up into the type of person who was good with horses!

Well, okay.