Treasures of the Heart

Grandparents Annual Christmas Fun Day in Sunny Gilbert, Arizona on December 13 included 13 active, beautiful, creative, adorable, mostly well-behaved grandchildren between the ages of 2 and 16. The two babies, born in November did not particiapate - neither did our dear Nunley family who live in Gallup, New Mexico. Parents were not invited, nor were they allowed to stay after dropping off the children at our home. They were to go shopping or to a movie or anything they wanted from 11:00 to 3:00. (That still wasn't quite enough time to finish up our plan for the day. ) We provided a lunch of taquitos, quesedillas and cheese crisp which the children could eat whenever they wanted. They could play or watch movies or do the crafts we organized. All the children made candels, even little Elora, mostly without help - just supervision. Later Uncle Jared showed them how to make twirly candels. All the children certainly had a lot of fun making messes and playing with cousins, and keeping their grandparents very busy. I must say we were totally exhausted by evening. But, it was so worth it!!!! The little girls loved playing on the teeter totter

when they got tired of doing crafts. Elora loved the candle project, which was done by dipping a string in hot, melted wax and then in ice cold water. All the children seemed happy with this project, but Elora especially loved carrying the candles around while she played.

Jesse's pop up card was so original that I displayed it here--this is a scoutmaster pop out that he prepared to give his scoutmaster.

This craft was the most complicated and dreamed

up by Gramie, Sylvia who didn't think she could

possibly be very creative. I had to show Annika's up close as she totally designed hers and told me where to glue every piece that went on.

These ornaments are created with an open cookie cutter, glued to a piece of felt. The children then chose lace, shells, ribbon, felt animals, and my favorite - little charms imported from Germany that I purchased on Ebay- the Doris Dotz miniatures. Five year old Felicity was incredible as she had been on the teeter-totter and came in late to make hers. I was so busy and suddenly realized she was drawing her ornament on the felt, cutting it out and decorating it all by herself. Wow!!!

These 3 ornaments are by Jill, Lucy and Sarah. Lucy's little village scene in the top green heart is exquisite.

These are the pop open cards designed by Grandaddy. The kids had so much fun doing them last year and were even more original this year.

Movie time - The Muppet's Christmas Carol - got cut short as we ran out of time. We had pop corn and ice cream sandwiches to snack on. I'm sure I'll be finding pop-corn till Christmas, but then I can remember the fun we had. Earlier some of the kids also watched the Disney Christmas Gift cartoon videos that the kids love.

The 3 pictures following are Gramie's attempt to be a photographer that she has dreamed of being from the time she was about 9 year old. These are not necessarilly the best of the 15 pictures I took, but they are the funnest or funniest or most creative.