Spruced Up $1 Mittens

These mittens are also gifts I gave out this year. Cheap, but cute! I bought the black gloves for a dollar at JoAnn Fabrics and then sewed ribbon bows and buttons on them to give them a little personality! They are just too cute! My sister says they remind her of Minnie Mouse. ;)

PB Seed Bread Bird Feeder

In October, Chad and I went to a Harvest Craft Show somewhere outside of Charlottesville. My biggest pet peeve is when they charge you to get in the stinkin’ shows. I think we each had to pay $5. We only spent 30 minutes looking around. I was so happy to find something that made the $10 worth it- a bird feeder! We paid $15 for a birdfeeder that looked like this one. Chad said he could definitely make them pretty easily. So I thought this would be a great handmade Christmas gift for family!! We used old wood scraps for most of it and Chad bought some wood for the top. I am sure if we totaled the prices for all the materials, it would be less than $5 to make each bird feeder. I thought what an inexpensive and unique gift to give! Our family really liked them too!

Chocolate Covered Double Stuffed Oreo Lollipops!

Ok… so I had the BEST time making yummy treats for the family this year. All the snow we got in Charlottesville was perfect timing to work on my chocolate covered pretzels and Oreos. Yes- OREOS!! I got the idea of chocolate covered Oreos on - http://www.howdoesshe.com/2009/12/oreo-cookie-sucker-tutorial/. It was pretty easy. Just time consuming. I decoupaged a terra cotta pot with holiday scrapbook paper, stuck the Oreo chocolate lollipops in foam, and covered the foam with cotton balls to look like snow! It turned out looking amazing! Martha, watch out! I think these would be great favors or centerpieces at a child’s party too!

Snow, Snow, and More SNOW!!

Snow, Snow, and MORE SNOW!!
Wow! It has snowed a total of 2 feet here in Charlottesville! The dogs are SO tired! They are having the BEST time playing in the snow! Chad and walk them to the high school next to us and let them play in the tennis courts. By the time we get home, they have balls and balls of snow stuck to their hair! Ugh. At first, Chad and I were trying to pull each one off, but then realized it was probably hurting them. So now we just send them down the basement after playing in the snow until all of their snowballs melt away!

Now it is time to do some last minute Christmas shopping! I wonder if we can find Chad's car in all of that snow!??

Snowed In... Productive Day!

Wow! This weekend, good ole' Mother Nature dumped about 2 feet of snow on Charlottesville! We were definitely snowed in and not going anywhere! It was a very productive day in the Rigdon house! I did worked on lots of fun things:
1. Painted a picture (I love process painting because it does not have to look like anything and it adds a splash of color to the room!)
2. Baked Chocolate Chip Cookies
3. Baked Peanut Butter Puppy Treats
4. Made an apron for a x-mas gift
5. Decoupaged a terra cotta pot Christmas style!! I will be making chocolate covered sprinkled Oreo lollipops and sticking them in the pot! It will be quite an attractive treat for family on Christmas eve!


Peanut Butter Puppy Treats

2 cups whole-wheat flour
1 tbsp. baking powder
1 cup peanut butter (chunky or smooth)
1 cup milk

Preheat oven to 375'F. In a bowl, combine flour and baking powder. In another bowl, mix peanut butter and milk, then add to dry ingredients and mix well. Place dough on a lightly floured surface and knead. Roll dough to 1/4 inch thickness and use a cookie cutter to cut out shapes. Bake for 20 minutes on a greased baking sheet until lightly brown. Cool on a rack, then store in an airtight container.

Gingerbread Houses with the Hubby!

For a little pre-birthday treat, Chad said he would decorate a gingerbread house with me! When he came home from the grocery store with 2 FULL bags of candy, I knew this was going to be a competition. Everything is competition for Chad. Everything. After dinner, we were looking at the photo calendar on the fridge. There was a picture of our Fallston house back in Maryland. We really, REALLY miss it. I know it is old and looks like it may be falling down, but it is our house. There is so much we would like to do with it if we end up moving back one day. (I HOPE. I PRAY!)

Anway... Chad must have had the idea to replicate our house in Fallston. Me, I had no idea what I was going to do. I just started plopping on the icing. Then, I decided it looked like a castle and went with that idea. After an hour and a half, I was geting very tired. I sprinkled on my finishing touches and then cleaned up my area. For Chad, he spent another hour working on his.


My Castle and Chad's Fallston Gingerbread House!!


Our Fallston House

Gingerbread House Fun!

The other day, I decided it would be fun to make gingerbread houses with my class! I kept thinking of way to make it a little easier so it would not turn out a disaster! I did not have time to save used milk cartons, so that was out of the question. Chad told me that his mom would hot glue the graham crackers together and then they would put everything else on with icing. So I decided this would be the easiest. The night before school, I put together 11 gingerbread houses. (I did not think about transporting all these houses. That was a dilemma later the next morning!) Then, I woke up at 5 in the morning to make 11 bags of icing for them! (What a dedicated teacher I am! ha ha!) They turned out SO cute and the kids had a great time. I remember when I was little, my gingerbread house would always fall apart.. this did not happen! Yay! Thank you hot glue gun!

Handmade Gift Time!

I told myself that for the holidays, I would try to make everyone at least one handmade gift. I thought it would save us some money, as well as keep me busy while Chad is at school. Well, that idea did not work out! There are only 10 more days until Christmas and I had many other crafts in mind that I never got to. Maybe next time. Here are a few things I made for friends recently for showers, birthdays, etc. I will post Christmas gift crafts after Christmas of course!

Felt and Ribbon Hair Bows for Aubrey's 1st Birthday

Farm Finger puppets for Lauren's baby shower

Dogs in the Snow

The dogs had a great time playing in the snow this past weekend! Norma loved to lick the snow and Pepper could not wait to catch snowballs! I attached a video of Chad and the dogs. Chad rolled a big ball of snow and Pepper had the time of her life destroying it! This is normally not like Pepper. She usually is the quiet one sniffing the sides of the fence. Norma was busy eating the snow. (I sound hilarious on this tape. I hate hearing myself!! Embarrassing!)

Christmas in the Kitchen

I love, love, love this time of year! This morning, I was on the road by 4 am. I made it back to VA by 7:15!! I was fighting falling asleep, but was so happy once I got home and had the whole day ahead of me! I unpacked super quickly, began working on laundry, cleaned and vacuumed the house, and then started decorating for Christmas! I have always wanted a Christmas tree in the kitchen!! Since I have a ridiculous amount of gingerbread ornaments (I LOVE Gingerbread people) I thought they would look good on the tree. Last year, I bought popcorn and candy garland. I stuck some berry sprigs in the holey parts of the tree. I also found some star cookie cutters that I used to use with my kindergarten class in the past. I tied cute polka dot ribbon to them and hung them on the tree too! The tree turned out SO cute.