Holidays

During Advent, some friends and I gathered weekly to make seasonal crafts via Zoom. Every part of it was fun, but an especially endearing part was how many people accepted the invitation saying “I stink at crafts, but I’m willing to try.” I love that spirit, and I love that friends were confident that we could do crafts together poorly and still have fun.

To be inclusive, our crafts had to: 1) require few pre-existing skills, 2) require few tools or materials since I bagged them up and delivered them to my friends, 3) be adaptive since our group included children through older adults and people with various abilities. And while most of my friends were from my church, not everyone was, so I chose mostly crafts that were wintertime-themed, not holiday themed.

Our final craft was a wooden snowman. Everyone in our group got a head start because I cut the wood and gave it the base layer of paint before I delivered the supplies to them.

Supplies

• 3 pieces of scrap wood of the same width and depth, cut to different lengths. Pieces could be as short as 2″ and up to 8″.
• black, gray, or dark blue craft paint
• white craft paint
• sand paper (optional)
• orange craft paint or an orange Sharpie
• assorted buttons, at least 3
• fabric at least 8 inches long to create a scarf
• twigs to create arms
• materials to make a hat (black stock paper, children’s sock + a ribbon, felt + jingle bell or pom-pom) or ear muffs (chenille stems + pom-poms)
• scissors
• hot glue gun and hot glue stick
• newspaper to create an area to work

Directions

1. Paint wooden blocks black, gray, or dark blue.
2. Paint again with white paint, allowing some of the darker color to peek through. Add as many layers of white paint as you prefer. When final coat is dry, use sandpaper to scruff it up a bit. The goal is to add depth to the wood by creating areas of darker and lighter wood.
3. Select which block will be the head, torso, and bottom, placing them on top of each other to create a thin, tall snowman. Experiment by arranging them in new orders and turning them a bit to different angles, so they are not perfectly stacked on top of each other.
4. Hot glue blocks on top of each other.
5. Use markers or paint to add eyes, a carrot nose, and a mouth.
6. Hot glue buttons in a vertical line on the torso.
7. Use hot glue to add sticks to either side of the torso for arms.
8. Create a fabric scarf by cutting a long piece of fabric or felt and then nipping the ends to create fringe. Circle around the neck and glue in place with a dot of glue on the rear of the neck. Tie the scarf in front, securing with a dab of glue.
9. Create a hat and glue in place.
   • Stocking cap: cut the toe off a child’s sock, then create fringe. Tie the fringe off with a ribbon and stuff the sock with scrap fabric or cotton balls.
   • Kerchief: Cut fabric into a equilateral triangle and secure with glue on top of the head and under the chin
   • Jingle cap: make a cap like for our pine cone elf
   • Top hat: cut a circle slightly larger than the top of the head from black cardstock and another slightly larger. Cut a strip that is the circumference of the circle and as wide as you want the hat’s height. Create a ring from the long strip and hot glue it between the two circles to form a hat.
   • Ear muffs: double a chenille stem that is slightly more than the length of the width of the head. Hot glue a pom-pom to either end of the stem. Bend into an arc. Glue to head, one pom-pom over each ear.

During Advent, some friends and I gathered weekly to make seasonal crafts via Zoom. Every part of it was fun, but an especially endearing part was how many people accepted the invitation saying “I stink at crafts, but I’m willing to try.” I love that spirit, and I love that friends were confident that we could do crafts together poorly and still have fun.

To be inclusive, our crafts had to: 1) require few pre-existing skills, 2) require few tools or materials since I bagged them up and delivered them to my friends, 3) be adaptive since our group included children through older adults and people with various abilities. And while most of my friends were from my church, not everyone was, so I chose mostly crafts that were wintertime-themed, not holiday themed.

We build an evergreen forest every year at our house, often reusing old trees but in new combinations. Here is how we do it:

Supplies:

• green cardstock of various sizes, with some at least large enough to trace a plate on
• pencil
• compass for creating circles or circles to trace (cereal bowls, plates, containers, etc.)
• scissors
• white craft paint + paint of other colors, such as silver, gold, and rose gold glitter
• hot glue gun and hot glue stick
• newspaper for your workspace

Directions:

1. Paint your paper with fun designs. Try polka dots, stripes, leopard print, sponge paint, zig zags, etc.
2. When the paper is try, trace a circle on the non-painted side. Cut out.
3. Cut a Pac-Man mouth out of each circle. Roll into a cone shape. The larger your mouth, the taller and skinnier the tree. You can even cut each circle in half, then roll the half into a cone. This will create a small overlap of the edges; secure with a line of hot glue.
4. Experiment with circles of different sizes and different size cuts to create trees of different sizes.
5. Use scissors to cut a zig zag around the bottom edge, or for something softer and more whimsical, cut a wave shape.
6. Cut circles of slightly different sizes, then stack the finished cones on top of each other to create trees of multiple layers.
7. Use additional markers to draw cardinals or squirrels on the trees, or add Christmas lights.
8. Add individual trees to cookie plates, or group together for a centerpiece or to cover a mantle.
9. We sometimes hide candies under the trees to help countdown to Advent.

During Advent, some friends and I gathered weekly to make seasonal crafts via Zoom. Every part of it was fun, but an especially endearing part was how many people accepted the invitation saying “I stink at crafts, but I’m willing to try.” I love that spirit, and I love that friends were confident that we could do crafts together poorly and still have fun.

To be inclusive, our crafts had to: 1) require few pre-existing skills, 2) require few tools or materials since I bagged them up and delivered them to my friends, 3) be adaptive since our group included children through older adults and people with various abilities. And while most of my friends were from my church, not everyone was, so I chose mostly crafts that were wintertime-themed, not holiday themed, though this one is an elf. This elf much cuter and cheaper than a name-brand Elf on the Shelf, so if that’s a tradition you want to enjoy with your kids, consider this little cutie as an alternative.

Supplies:

• pine cone (with or without white tips, as you prefer)
• wooden ball for head
• black Sharpie or other marker or paint and paintbrush
• felt in 1-3 colors
• mini-jingle bell or pom-pom
• hot glue gun and glue stick
• scissors

Directions

1. If the end of the pine cone is not flat, flatten by pulling off some scales.
2. Choose a felt color for your elf’s shoes. Cut a double thickness of material into a heart shape. Glue the two pieces of fabric together, one on top of the other. Then glue to the bottom of the pine cone, so the point of the heart faces the elf’s back.
3. Glue the wooden ball to the top of the pine cone. If it drips, don’t worry–you’ll cover it with Elfie’s scarf later.
4. Cut a large isosceles triangle (2 sides the same length) from a piece of felt, with the third side (which will form the opening of the hat) cut with a slight curve. Roll into a cone shape so that the opening fits over the wooden ball. Hot glue the seam shut.
5. Hot glue the jingle bell (or pom-pom, if you prefer) to the tip of the hat.
6. Cut a long strip of felt to serve as a scarf. Cut small nips into the end to create fringe. Wrap around Elfie’s neck. Add a dollop of glue to the back of Elfie’s neck to hold in place. Knot in front, or layer the ends, holding in place with glue.
7. Use a Sharpie to add a face, or paint on. Don’t forget the ears!
8. Create more for an elf community, or add a decorative string loop to hang from a tree or add to a garland. If you used a mini pinecone, you can even thread the elf onto ribbon decorating a gift.

During Advent, some friends and I gathered weekly to make seasonal crafts via Zoom. Every part of it was fun, but an especially endearing part was how many people accepted the invitation saying “I stink at crafts, but I’m willing to try.” I love that spirit, and I love that friends were confident that we could do crafts together poorly and still have fun.

To be inclusive, our crafts had to: 1) require few pre-existing skills, 2) require few tools or materials since I bagged them up and delivered them to my friends, 3) be adaptive since our group included children through older adults and people with various abilities. And while most of my friends were from my church, not everyone was, so I chose mostly crafts that were wintertime-themed, not holiday themed.

Above, we created both vertical and horizontal evergreen garlands so we could string them over the entry way between the dining room and living room. I used paint chips with two shades, creating a line between the trunk and the triangle-shape of the needles with the white line that divides the two colors. I kept it simple with a triangle shape, but you could use scissors to cut fringe into the tree for more texture, or create layers of needles.

This craft required just a few supplies:

• Scissors
• Decorative string (I chose gold and silver), cut to the length of garland you want. If you aren’t sure, try 8 feet.
• 16 paint chips from a hardware store*
• Assorted pieces of light cardboard, like from a cereal box, cut to the size of the paint chips
• pencil
• newspaper
• hot glue gun and hot glue sticks

*What color paint chips? It depends on shape you want to string on your garland. Good wintertime choices include evergreen trees (so choose one color of dark green or an assortment of greens), Christmas lights (so choose bright green and red, or the pinks, greens, and blues of echo the colors of Shiny Bright ornaments), or stars (various shades of yellow or all the same shade, if you prefer). You can pull in additional supplies to make stocking caps (red paint chips plus a small white puffball or tiny jingle bell on the end) or presents (any color you like + gel pens to draw in the ribbon).

Directions:

Draw a template of your design on a small piece of cardboard. If you prefer, you can print a simple shape from an online template. Simple is best. Cut it out.

• Trace the template onto the back of the paint chip. If your chip includes two tones, consider working that into the decoration. For example, I used two-tone green chips for my trees, with one color for the trunk and the other the evergreen needs.
• Cut your paint chips along the lines you traced.
• Tie a small knot in each end of your decorative string.
• Decide if you want your garland to hang horizontally or vertically. For some shapes (like stars), this might not matter. For others, it does.
• Create a workstation on a piece of newspaper. Dab hot glue on the back of each decoration (tree, star, present, hat, etc.), then press string into the dab, without touching the glue. Repeat every 6 inches if you created 16 decorations for an 8 foot garland. Or add more if you like!
• Mix and match decorations for a garland with a lot of variety, or string only one kind of decoration on a single garland.
• Hang on your tree or over a mantle or shelf or around a door. These can be fun to add to a traditional green garland. Or wrap around a present.
• Alternatively, you can cut the string to 4 inches and glue it in a loop on the back of one of the decoration and use as a gift tag.
• Or create individual decorations for your tree, like our Christmas pickles.