Holiday Crafts

Most Decembers I'm fairly unimpressed with the Christmas season. I skirt along it, half-in half-out. This  year I was more prepared. I have more energy this year than I can remember in a long, long time and Sebastian is at a decent "activity" age. I combined my procrastination for creative projects with the holiday spirit. I had a head-start, too, somehow, even as my second-to-last grad school semester wound down, or should I say amped up in deadlines and such demands. We've had a few days of "waiting for the telephone woman!" (which is Sebastian's sweet way of saying we've been without proper phone and internet for half the month and have spent at least twenty hours in the last two weeks cooped up waiting in vain for the f$*&@#$# phone technicians to arrive... haaa...) which meant we had a lot of craft time. It started with tree ornaments. I wanted a really nice, porcelain-type DIY dough, not the yellow grit of salt dough, but when the day came to make them I of course didn't have the internet to look up an alternative dough recipe so salt dough it was. It turns out salt dough doesn't take an imprint very well, so ornament day turned into an exercise in medium. We scoured the house for anything we thought might make a more aggressive imprint than, say, lace or feathers. The winners were a throw-back eighties Tupperware lid, a toy Sheriff's badge, a rubber doily and Bananagram tiles. The thrills of being without internet! Next time I would use this dough.

We, and by we I mean I, also felted some balls. I have to admit, felting has always creeped me out for irrational reasons, and beyond that I don't love the aesthetic. But I wanted to try make a garland and thought I should give felting a try. I do like the look of balls and bought some really nice angora wool with kind of a pink, red and white blend. I haven't assembled the garland yet and have a few more balls to make. It's pretty time consuming, another good one for waiting for the phone guy. There has also been lots of cookie making. Rosemary lemon shortbread is my favourite.