Decorative and Delicious Candy Jar

I love checking out the Target dollar section. It's been a while since I've been able to browse the items, mostly because I've been avoiding stores/buying items because Manuel and I have been looking for a house. Thankfully we finally went through the process and I am so grateful we closed on a home last week, right before Thanksgiving.

Before I go off on a tangent about that, I wanted to keep going with the dollar section at Target. They have such cute things for all seasons, and I've purchased prizes and items to use in craft and science programs at the library, such as kitchen scales and Halloween socks. Sometimes they have really cute jars - all shapes and sizes - to use for crafts, and I bought a beautiful jar (this one was $3) and some holiday candy to fill it up with.

Mostly it's for my family to enjoy and to have as a holiday centerpiece at the table. I also found some peppermint bark bells and some Peanuts holiday crunch bells. Very cute!

It's nice seeing the red, green, and silver candies in the jar. And I wanted to include this awesome Hershey's Kiss Santa Hat in this post, just because it is so clever to have the kiss shaped like a Santa hat, with HO HO HO on the white strip of paper. This one is a little large, which I think makes it even cuter. I love when they make larger than usual kisses.

Peppermint Candy Craft

This is a great craft to do during the holidays. You can make a peppermint candy ornament or decoration using toilet paper rolls, striped peppermint candy-like wrapping paper, cellophane paper, tape, and ribbon and/or yarn.

This cellophane has snowflakes on it.

Wrap the wrapping paper around the toilet paper roll and secure with a piece of tape. Cut a piece of cellophane larger than the toilet paper roll and wrap around the toilet paper roll and secure with tape. Pinch the ends like a candy wrapper and tie a piece of yarn to create the candy wrapper look. You can also use ribbon if you prefer, or use ribbon to make a loop to hang the candy from your tree. 

Too cute!!

Holiday Bulletin Boards

For the main holiday bulletin board, I wanted to make a gingerbread house scene:

The bottom says "Reading is Snow Sweet" in candy cane font.

I made five snowmen to put over the computers. They are made out of plain white computer paper, construction paper, candy cane-striped wrapping paper, with google eyes and pipe cleaner hands. Their smiles are made out of tiny hole-punched silver and gold dots.

I found the pipe cleaner snowflakes in the craft cabinet we have, and I made the phrase "Season's Readings" with the candy cane-striped wrapping paper. 

I was originally going to include the phrase "Season's Readings" in this Christmas lights font, along with these book trees I made, but I ultimately went with the snowmen and the snowflakes. 

Happy Holidays!

Great Christmas Books

Christmas is one of my most favorite times of the year, and I wanted to share a few picture books that I have come to love along with traditional classics such as The Night Before Christmas.

The first, Where Teddy Bears Come From, by Mark Burgess and Russell Ayto, is a beautiful story about a little wolf who wants a teddy bear, but doesn't know where they come from. He travels through the forest asking three little pigs and a little girl and her grandmother, but no one knows, until he bumps into a kind old man with a white beard who has the answer.

The second book, Stick Man, by Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler, is about a Stick Man with three stick children and his Stick Lady Love, who all live together in the Family Tree. While out for a run one day, Stick Man is taken far from his family, until he helps a kind old man with a white beard come down a chimney after he gets stuck. Stick Man helps the kind old man deliver gifts, and in return is given a gift of his own.

I really love how these two stories both involve a character who does not know that they have just bumped into Santa Claus, and that because of their kindness and help towards Santa Claus, they get a gift themselves in return. I think these two would be good for a Christmas storytime because of this similarity.

The third book, Santa's New Suit by Laura Rader, is a really fun read that could be combined with another fun Christmas book such as Merry Christmas Splat by Rob Scotton. Santa Claus finds that all his suits are old and dirty and torn and red, and goes out to buy a new suit. The problem is that while he loves his new suit, no one else seems to, and children even have trouble recognizing him. Mrs. Claus helps him go back to his traditional suit in the end without even saying a word. The fun voice bubbles in this book make it really fun to read, and it is fun to see Santa Claus's humor in this book.

A Christmas Caroline

I've been reading A Christmas Caroline, by Kyle Smith, lately and I just finished it yesterday. Yes, it is exactly what it sounds like - a take on A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, but with a modern, hip-girl twist. Caroline is in the role of Ebenezer, but this isn't just a take on the classic by Dickens; there is more Dickens embedded into this book than I thought there would be.

For example, a few names from the beginning of the book: Ursula Heep, Arabella Allen, Caroline's roomate (who has passed away) is Carly Jacobs, Trot Copperfield, Nic Nickleby, and many others. Dickens is sprinkled all over this book, and one of the things that I most loved about this book had to do with a tie-in to a very specific Dickens book that I love in particular.

Read more, but beware of spoilers (I'll narrow the font size so it won't be so large below).

Caroline's last name is.........Havisham! And, her childhood friend whom she used to tease was nicknamed Philly, and now he is the very successful owner of ...Pip's Doughnuts...and of course his name is Philip Pirrip. I thought it was something that the author decided to keep the whole name, even though others are edited slightly. There is an obvious tie-in to Great Expectations, with Estella (Caroline) and Pip (Philip) ending up together. When I reached the end, I was so surprised (shocked, even) to find that Caroline was a Havisham, but then it fit so well, so perfectly. And her mother, La, designs....dun dun dun....wedding dresses! A lot of it is, of course, modern, but I thought it was really neat of the author to add so much Dickens to the book, not just from A Christmas Carol.