Holidates!

I have a friend who has homeschooled all 6 of her children until they are in high school.  One of her reasons is that she wants to be their number one influence during those impressionable early adolescent years!  What a great idea!   

And although I’m not cut out to homeschool my dear daughter ….I value her life more than that!  I can lay heavy on the influencing!  In fact, I’m prepared to influence all over her! With her now changing body, raging hormones and 5^th grade drama…I kick myself that this hasn’t been the norm all throughout her life.  I hope I’m not too late – YIKES!

I began this quest this holiday season, spending lots of one on one time with my girly.  Being home alone two evenings a week while dad is away gave us perfect opportunity.  I informally dubbed our times together as our “Holidates” and two nights a week throughout the advent season we did something “Christmasy” together. 

We’ve been close to harpooning each other at times – but for the most part we’ve had a great time!

 

Here’s how it all went down.

1.  Holidate #1:  Operation Gingerbread House

It’s not the Gingerbread Palaces or mansions you see on Display at the local department store but we did it ourselves and we felt quite accomplished afterwards.  We did learn two things.  1.) Neither of us are very patient when it comes to crafts and 2). Neither of us like sweet tarts!  Blek!

 

 

Unfortunately the only pic of alledged gingerbread house ...can't really see much of it!
 

2.  Holidate #2: Christmas Card Craft

Armed with stick on foam penguins, snow men and reindeer, Christmas ribbon, card stock and markers we commenced to creating Christmas Cards.  Christmas music played in the background and I found this to be an extremely joyous time!  I made about 5 million of these cards and Hannah made…..2!  She assured me over and over it was fun!  Two things I learned here were:  1) body language speaks louder than words and   2).  I won’t be applying for a job at Hallmark anytime soon.

 

3. Holidate #3 Make it and Take it Night

The ground work was laid out for me here. Our neighbor had a make it and take it craft night. It was great fun and Hannah got to use a Cricut (a very fancy cutting machine used in scrapbooking)! We also took pop top cans that we had opened from the bottom, emptied out and cleaned. We covered them with paper and ribbons, filled them with m&m’s and hot glued the bottom back on. The recipient of this cute mystery gift will have to pop the top to see what’s inside and enjoy it’s contents! Great idea eh? Not mine of course! What did we learn here? 1. Cricut paper cutters are waaay more exciting than foam penguins 2. Walking home in the dark with a bad flashlight and watching mom slip in the mud is even better than a Cricut paper cutter L.

 

 

 

4.  Holidate #4 – Christmas Shopping

Miss Hannah was overjoyed when I told her our Holidate agenda included shopping!  We headed out to Wally World to do her shopping for her brothers and gift exchanges.  We had great success!  Afterwards I offered to treat her to a fast food dinner.  She decided she wasn’t very hungry but would love a hot apple pie from McDonalds.  Sure, why not?  It is a holidate afterall and we’re throwing all caution to the wind (literally).   Pies had just come out of the oven and were almost impossible to eat.  So, I did what any sensible mother would do, I rolled down my window and held the pie out the window in the cold December air to cool it off as I drove down the road!  Lessons learned:  1) I am not the poster child for good parenting tips  2) If you want to really make your kid laugh – hang their dessert out the window!

5. Holidate #3 –Mosaic Ornaments

Aunt Jane came to the rescue on this one. She donated this wonderful kit to us that she found in her own craft closet! We armed ourselves with tweezers and a preheated oven and set out to making these lovely ornaments. With a “paint by number” type system for the craft challenged like ourselves this was a big hit! Very pretty! We learned…1). Tweezers are for more than plucking these days.. 2). Turns out ovens “ain’t” just for baked goods”!

 

 

 

6.  Holidate #6.  Wrapping it up

With Christmas tunes playing in the background and paper, bags, ribbons and bows all laid out for us, Hannah and I commenced to wrapping presents!!  We picked a specific pattern of paper for each person, made our own name tags and had a great time.  We ended the night by bagging up homemade cappuccino, paired them with our homemade cards and Hannah delivered them to the neighbors!! Lessons…1). Scotch tape doesn’t stick to paper that has a lot of glitter on it 2).  Stick on foam figures make good name tags also….will we ever run out of these?

 

7. Holidate #7 – Light Bright

We included Dad in on the fun!  He was chauffeur, money bank and the lead in all of our caroling to the radio songs!  We drove to Mishawaka to a subdivision that puts on a big light display each year.  They take a donation and all proceeds go to eight different charities  - double score!  We had such a good time and said “oooh and ahhh” a lot.   We ended the evening with a trip to Starbucks (and Target to pick up “yet” more groceries) and sang songs the whole way home.  Super fun and our best guy was with us – which made it over the top!  What we took away from this night… 1).  Taking pics of houses from the back seat of a moving vehicle results in lots of pics of mailboxes and lots of giggles from all involved  2).  Dad’s are just great….’nuff said!

a few of the pics that didn't have a mailbox in the forefront :)
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unfortunately, the stomach flu kept us away from Holidate fun for a couple of nights...but all in all I think our Holidate experience went pretty well.  This might just be a tradition we keep up! 


Merry Christmas to all - enjoy every moment together!  Celebrate all year long!