Last week while Kevin (my bro) was out of town, I decided in leu of a Christmas 🎄 tree, I would make some decorations for his living room.

So I frosted new mason jars with modge podge and Epsom salts and decorated the rims with natural materials and put flameless tea lights inside.

I placed them above his fireplace on the mantel.

I wanted to also make paper Christmas trees that look like the old-fashioned ones we used to make from the pages of magazines, but I did it wrong, so maybe this week.

See, we don’t do presents anymore, focusing instead on the “reason for the season” and I hate seeing a tree with no presents under it.

Next, I made decoration for the blank wall space next to his tv. These were created from grocery sacks and hand painted, glittered, or twinned, one even has the combo of Epsom salts and flour to create the “snow” on the snowman. By some miracle, his carrot tip of a nose stayed glued on, even though I didn’t give it much time to adhere.

I used a cheap version of Alien Tape to stick em to the wall. Two are backed by cardboard cereal boxes so they wouldn’t curl up. Obviously, it wasn’t the presents. I had to stick more tape under them. I sure hope they come off the wall without taking the paint!

Lastly, in the spirit of 3D paper crafts (I wanted snowflakes) I made an angel and a couple of other decorations with the folded paper technique.

On another blank wall space I put these up with pushpins. I should have painted them but left them as they were. I like them ok.

I was rushing to get done before he came home. I almost made it, but didn’t get the pushpins until Saturday night. He was pleasantly surprised with them and with David’s work in the back yard. He has been rebuilding his deck for him, which came in handy since Kevin hurt his knee. He’s at the doctor today getting it looked at.

Im also going to finish a crocheted hot pad I started for him and paint a picture of a Christmas tree to replace a picture I did a while back.

This one needs to be added to the Strange World gallery, haha! Anyway, I did a practice painting but it was terrible, so I’ll try again later. Turns out I have cheap brushes and that is probably why I can’t paint good pine trees. Or palm trees for that matter. Then again, I may need to just keep practicing my technique.

We still don’t even know the plan for Christmas because we are waiting to hear what Dave’s niece wants to do. But I will be ready. I’m ready in my heart always, as I am in His word daily. Kevin will be home all week on vacation, so I’m determined to do some Christmas-y activities besides watching tv all the time.

On that note, I have watched a couple of cute Christmas movies. Oh What Fun is a cute homage to the underappreciated moms everywhere. Home for the Holidays with Holly Hunter is one of my favs. I saw that one week before last. The season will not get by without me watching Love Actually…one of the best in my opinion.