A day of crafting in the kitchen

Christmas is speeding up on me fast. Without tons of extra cash stuffed under our couch cushions (you don't even want to know what stuffed under those things ;-) handmade gifts are the way to go. I love to receive handmade gifts, but I enjoy making them so much more. I think a basket of homemade goodies is so special. The girls wanted to get in on all of this handmade goodness, so I have been racking my brain, trying to think of fun easy things they can do. Some things, I like to do all alone though....so as soon as I got them started on their school work, I got to work in the kitchen. I made One pan granola.

My house smells so wonderful right now. You have to sniff  REALLY hard to know that the dogs are in here right now!! :-)

1 cup coconut oil

1 cup honey

1/2 cup water

2 teaspoons vanilla   Heat these ingredients until warm and thinned.

Add 6 cups rolled oats

1 cup almond flour

1 cup whole wheat flour

1/2 cup wheat germ

1/2 cup mixed sunflower seeds, flax seeds, pumpkin seeds etc.

1/2 cup dry milk powder

1 cup shredded coconut

1 cup mixed nuts

2 teaspoons cinnamon

1 tablespoon brown sugar

Bake at 250 degrees for 2 hours, stirring every 20 minutes. When cooled add dried fruit. 

This goes so yummy on top of yogurt and ice cream, or in a bowl of almond milk with cut up bananas. Boy I'm hungry! :-)

After school we decided to finally get around to making our Christmas countdown paper chain.

 This will be ever so helpful since the girls ask EVERY morning, "how many days till Christmas now?" I will have one girl tear a ring off each day to show how many days are left.

 Grace was right at "the best part" of her book and asked if she could skip the activity. Don't ya just love a good book? :-)

After lunch we started working on one of the presents they will be giving away. Crayons. No, not boring crayons in a box. Homemade designer crayons!

 We had to take the wrappers off of our old broken crayons...

Sort into new color creations.....

 Popped them into the oven at 170 degrees for around 20 minutes or so. After they cooled down a bit, we stuck them in the freezer for a few minutes so they could easily be popped out of the mini muffin tin.

 TADAA.....new crayons that not only are the girls super excited to give away, it gave us a LONG afternoon activity. We stayed in one room most of the day, so you know what that means, only one room to clean up!!

 Part of the fun of Christmas, is the getting ready for it, and today was no exception. We made memories and frugal gifts all at the same time!