YOU are a good mom!

A friend posted THIS on Facebook today.

As I read it, I was reminded of all the lies I used to believe about myself as a mom. It hit hard, and I HATE how the enemy can creep in, be so sneaky about it, and the cycle of those beliefs can start all over again if we aren't watching carefully, prioritizing our time with the Lord to be on guard so that the enemy will not come in a feed us those lies.

So mamas, will you please take a minute to read this? Don't let the enemy tell you things that you are NOT! You are a good mama, you're doing your best, and YOUR best is different than someone else's best, so don't compare. Look to the One who can tell you who He sees you as, do not believe the lies the enemy tells you. Be on guard and in prayer over your household, your children, yourself, so that the enemy knows he is not welcome in your home.

Hand/Footprint Christmas Projects

It's almost Christmas! Eeeeek! I LOVE LOVE LOVE Christmas. We've been having unseasonably warm weather this December here in Michigan and currently it is raining outside (with a chance of thunderstorms tonight) Doesn't look like I'll be getting my white Christmas....sigh.

Something that I have enjoyed doing for my mom and dad as well as my mother and father in-law each Christmas that we have had children is to create a hand/footprint craft for them.I try and pick something that they can use as part of their decorating for the holidays. It's been fun to see the projects grow from 1 child's hand prints to having to figure out how to use 3 kiddos prints for the craft. Thanks to pinterest I have gotten some lovely ideas. I'm not super crafty and my projects don't always turn out like the picture ideas I have gathered (in fact, I wouldn't be surprised if someone pinned mine on the 'pinterest fail' site), but that's okay. What matters is the love put in to each gift and how excited the grandparents are to get them each Christmas.

For each of my children's first Christmas I did a clear glass ball ornament and put their hand print on it and used puff paint to put their name and the year. 

Here are the projects that I have currently done:

2011 - 1 child hand/footprint reindeer

2012 - 2 children footprint "mistleTOES"

2013 - 2 children hand print wreath

2014 - 3 children Snowmen footprints

2015 3 children - Manger Scene footprint people and hand print animals (cow, donkey, camel)

Christmas Gifts for Teachers

As I continue to seek what the Lord has in mind for this blog, I am feeling as though it's supposed to be a place to encourage moms, share ideas that have worked for my family and things have maybe haven't worked. It's a place where I can share my joys and my messes of motherhood amidst the sticky fingers and laundry piles that flood my home (and I'm thankful for them). 

As I'm taking a few minutes to sit down while my younger two are napping (or resting quietly, cuz let's be honest, my 3.5 year old has decided he doesn't want to nap anymore), I wanted to share a project that two of my boys worked on this week for their teachers for Christmas presents. I can't take the credit for the ideas....pinterest helped.

Being a former teacher, I have received my share of gifts from students. I love how excited they were to show me what they have chosen, made, or bought for me. For me, some of my favorites are the ones that are made by the kiddos themselves, but it was also nice to receive something that I could use myself. I believe that teachers play such an important role in my children's lives as I am entrusting them with my children for many hours of the day (an homeschooling mamas....you rock too! I hope you occasionally get some 'teacher gifts' or bless yourself with something for a job well done). We wanted to bless our teachers with a little gift this Christmas season.

My oldest son is in Kindergarten. For his teacher's gift we did a gift card to Target (because Target is awesome!), a pack of colored pens (most early elementary teacher's love cute colored markers for lists, labeling, etc. I know I still do and I don't even teach anymore!), and some homemade pretzel hugs (a holiday favorite at our house). Below is the way we make pretzel hugs at our home.

My middle son, is in preschool and attends 2 days a week. We gave his teacher a Target gift card, some colored mini pens, and pretzel hugs. He also has a teacher assistant in his class and we wanted to bless her with a little something as well so we made her a Reindeer cup (with a Bigby gift card inside). I got the idea from pinterest after making THIS for my sons preschool teachers a few years ago (except we used Bigby coffee). 

Reindeer Cup:

I made an antler pattern and had my son cut it out as best as he could (he's 3.5 and still learning to work with scissors, I was really proud of how well he did!) You can see the cup with the gift card (I just asked for a small cup but any size would do when I purchased my gift card, don't forget to ask for a lid!) two googly eyes and a red pom pom and some glue (we used craft glue but you could use a hot glue gun if you wanted, since I wanted my son to make the project, we used craft glue)

I wrote "Merry Christmas Miss ____ love Brekan" and had him write his name. We glued this piece to the back of the cup.

Completed project! I think it turned out super cute!

Pretzel Hugs:

You will need circle pretzels (mine are from our grocery store, meijer brand), Hershey Hugs (regular kisses don't melt as well), and M&M's (I used red and green for Christmas)

Prehead your oven to 170 degrees (or warm)

I set up two trays with parchment paper and the pretzels on top and let my boys put the hugs inside each one (after hand washing of course). It's a wonderful fine motor activity and I just love this baking project because they can be involved in almost the whole process. You could even have them count how many they are doing. For each teacher I used 1 full bag of Hershey's Hugs. I only bought 1 bag of M&M's and had many leftover (lucky me)

Once the hugs are in all the pretzels I put them in the oven and keep an eye on them. You don't want them to melt completely but you need them to be soft enough to push down the M&M's and fill in the circle. If I was guessing it was between 5-10 minutes they were in the oven.

Take the trays out of the oven when ready and set on the counter (or hot plate if you need one). This next part you need to be quick so I helped my boys. Put the M&M's in the center of the hugs and push down gently. Then you let them set (I usually do it overnight) until they cool completely. I made a mistake this time and tried to take the parchment paper off the tray as to not have the hot tray around the boys. That didn't work as well as you can see the wrinkles in the paper and they didn't turn out as uniform as I was hoping (oh well, they still taste amazing). You can also try and put the M&M's on letter side down so you don't see any of the M's...because my boys were doing this project, it didn't matter, but if you wanted the uniformity of it you could do it that way as well for a cleaner look.

I bought little tins at the dollar store and lined with wax paper to fill up. 

There ya go! Merry Christmas! I think the teachers enjoyed their gift this year.