Christmas Decorations

Perhaps the best Yuletide decoration is being wreathed in smiles. ~ Author Unknown

I have been wreathed in many smiles this week by little ones enjoying the activities as we prepare for Christmas.   We enjoyed making these saltdough decorations which Mel inspired us to make.

Ess and I prepared the dough while Eee was having her morning sleep as I did not think she would be interested in sitting in the kitchen for very long.  Ess absolutely loved colouring the dough and choosing the various combinations of food colourings to make different colours.  We love the orchid colour in the centre, above, and also the marbly pinky red which became a butterfly when cut.

When it came to kneading the colour into the dough Ess was not so keen. "Too ooey!!", she exclaimed.  She didn't like the feel of it.    This led onto rolling the dough out and cutting it into shapes.  Although she did make many many shapes with her cutters.

Once little Eee awoke the dough was ready to roll and cut to her hearts content. She was delighted!  This was new to her as we have not yet taken out playdough for little Eee to explore, although I have planned to make Christmas Playdough for her.  I will definitely have that on the agenda for next week - after we enjoy Ess's birthday party on Saturday.

She was delighted with the colours, textures and manoeuverability of the dough.  We heard lots of "oh's" and  "ooooooh's" and saw many smiles as well as little fingers prodding and poking the dough.  Interestingly she made no attempt to eat the dough.  I am sure she would have loved to as the colours were so bright.  

Eee easily got the hang of the shape cutting thing and placed the cutter on top of a ball of dough saying "dere" (ie there!).  She needed my help to put enough pressure on her chubby little 15 month old hand to cut the shape. But she delighted in seeing the result.

We used a straw to cut holes to allow us to hang the decorations.  Eee quickly figured this our s also and poked the straw in many places over the cut ornament - surprisingly aiming for the already cut hole very well.

The end result of our ornament creating morning is bright and pleasing but more importantly we all enjoyed the activity together.  This is what fills my heart most.  Creating together!

I think little Eee would have loved to eat the finished product which looked like yummy cookies piled high on a plate.