Once you start, you can't stop.

I got a couple days to catch up on. Seems I broke my winter craft seal, and now I can't stop myself LOL. The kids and I got started last night on our snowman family salt dough decoration...another Pinterest find :)
We made the snowmen and cooked them...then they had to cool overnight. Everyone got to make their own, with just a little help.

Rolling, rolling, rolling.

Ready to bake!

I used:
2 cups of all purpose flour
1 cup kosher salt
 1/2 cup sea salt
5 tsps. cinnamon...gives it a yummy smell :)
1 1/4 (+ a little extra) cups of water.

You will also need some orange tooth picks...1/2 per snowman, 2 twigs per snowman, felt scraps, mini pom pom's, some pipe cleaners and acrylic paint. I found my hot glue gun to be very helpful too.

Preheat oven to 250 F. Mix together, salt, flour, and water until a dough is formed. Knead the dough on a floured surface until the mixture is elastic and smooth. If dough is too sticky, sprinkle with flour, continue to do so until stickiness is gone. Just be careful not to add too much flour, this will dry out the dough and will cause it to crack before you get a chance to bake it.

Roll dough in your hands to form different sized balls. Make however many snowmen from the balls, then line them up on the cookie sheet. Make sure they are touching each other so that they will be one piece after baking.

Break or cut orange toothpicks in half. Insert toothpick halves, point side out, into the each snowman head for the nose. Insert twigs for arms into each snowman. Be sure to do both of these steps BEFORE baking. 

Bake for approximately 2.5 - 3 hours. Remove from oven and allow to cool completely. For best results, allow to cool and dry overnight, or for at least 4 hours. Once dry paint and add scarves, hats, ear muffs...whatever you want.

This was going to be my photo challenge photo for Day 20: I'm listening to. I love Christmas music :)

Then I got this photo of Miss Bug singing out Jingle Bells loud and proud...LOL awesome! Gangster looks like he is not enjoying the serenade all that much Hehehe.

Today we all braved the stores to finish up a little Christmas shopping for others. The trio did really well...they are growing up. With only a little reminding, for the most part, they were happy to know we were out shopping for other people and not getting them things. Then all 4 of them spent a good 12 minutes in line...they did so great the lady checking us out said to them "I'm a Mom and a Grandma, and let me tell you you guys did such a great job waiting. I know it is not easy to be patient, way to go." Then she added a "Good job Mom and Dad." to Jason and I too :) 

Saw this while shopping, and I really wanted to buy it...'Tis the season for jerk shoppers :)

After dinner the kiddos got to start painting our snowman family.
They did the white...I did everything else LOL.

They did a great job, though our orange noses are going to need a fresh coat of orange...and a few of the twigs look like they have a little snow on them.

Jericho actually helped with this craft for a few minutes.

Then I got to work on the snowmen alone, after I sicked the kids on Jason...and suggested they should help him wrap a couple gifts. Jason loved me right then LOL. After the kids went to be Jason and I spent like 2 hours wrapping gifts for the kiddos, and our families. I love this part, though the next couple days waiting for opening time will be rough.

Jericho took a break to abuse love on O.J. Poor cat, why don't you run?

Snowman painting coming along.

All done...this turned out so cute!

One of the boys big gifts...another Craigslist steal...$25! Big thanks to Auntie Stacie who picked it up for us and drove it from Bend to Portland. I can't wait for the boys to see this, now I'm sure they won't be jealous of the girls big doll house.

Today's photo challenge...Day 21: On the door. Nothing too exciting this time...I didn't get around to making any cute wreaths or anyting, so this is all we got LOL.