DIY Holiday Crafts

A lot of these projects were inspired by pinterest pictures and posts, which I've linked to the name of each craft below.

Sock Snowman and Sock Santa- Santa was inspired by a snowman with a red hat - I used a red sock for Santa's body/ hat and a white one for his head/beard. The mustache for Santa and the nose for the Snowman were made out of felt. These tutorials recommend using beans or rice to fill your sock creations. I would suggest putting either beans or rice in the bottom, and then filling the rest with a cloth stuffing. Man-cub D through these around like crazy, and having these be all of rice made them more dangerous projectiles. So I ended up gutting them and adding the cloth filling.

Reindeer and Snowman Felt ornaments- I used cotton balls as extra stuffing for these cute ornaments! For the details of the snowmen, I used a black and an orange sharpie. Man-cub D learned the songs Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and Once There Was a Snowman because of these ornaments.

Felt Nativity- I've been eyeing the little people nativity for months, but concluded it was just too expensive for this year. So I made my own finger puppet nativity! The outline for everyone except Baby Jesus was used from my Quiet Book posts. I chose not to be as detailed with their dress since I hot glued everything. I've learned that the more things you glue, the stiffer the puppets become, and the harder it is to fit your finger in. For Baby Jesus, I chose to cut out a brown arch and then a star shaped piece of yellow felt for the hay. I only glued down the outer sides of the hay so I could slide my finger between the brown and yellow pieces. 

DIY Mickey Mouse Stocking- My mom sent me this idea (thanks mom!) and I just had to try it. You'll see I altered it a bit since I used two pom poms that came with the stocking. I also didn't have enough black felt to do an entire head, so I just did the ears. 

Overall, these crafts have been quick and cheap to do! Man-cub D has gotten a kick out of all his new "gifts" this month, and has enjoyed playing with them all (minus the stocking).