DIY Outdoor Christmas Tree Decorations

I managed to make it half way though November before the Christmas decorations came out. That's some sort of record for me. Because the husband and I are both still kids when it comes to Christmas, we have to set a limit on how many decorations we buy each year, and that includes lights. This year, he opted to buy a few of the inflatable outdoor decorations, and we had to retire a couple, so it really didn't feel like we added anything this year. While we were out shopping this weekend, we saw some outdoor decorations for sale that I knew we could make ourselves. The decorations were basically tomato cages turned upside down, then donned with tinsel, lights and some decorations. They were $9.99 each, which wasn't a bad price, but I knew we could make some with items we already had around the house, which essentially makes them free. I can do free!

I grabbed three tomato cages from the garage. We had a few that have been through many garden seasons and were starting to fall apart, literally. I figured these would be perfect for this because I don't have to undo it all to use them again in the spring. But, with just a few snips, they could be ready to go for garden use if we needed to.

Mine were a bit mangled, so I started by straightening them as much as I could, then flipped it upside down and tied the top together with zip ties. Have I mentioned I love zip ties? I think half of our house/garage/chicken coops/fencing is held together with zip ties.

Next, add the lights and tinsel, wrapping around the "trees", securing with zip ties along the way. Then add your ornaments and a tree topper. We used star ornaments as the tree toppers.

All that's left is to trip the zip ties. They look like something out of a Dr. Seuss book at this point, but that's ok. Once they are outside and turned on, no one will notice. 

The last step is to take them out and plug them in!

Made From Scratch Tuesday 12/20

Christmas is only days away. That means my kitchen is on overdrive this week!

 I've been making buckeyes

Danish Wedding Cakes

Peppermint Pinwheels (a new addition from last year)

And of course, Peanut Butter Blossoms!

 What holiday goodies are you baking in up your kitchen this week?

Now it's time to link up all of your creations!
Here are the rules:
1. You can link up as many posts as you'd like.
2. The post has to be made from scratch.
3. The post you link up MUST CONTAIN A RECIPE!
4. If you want to put my button somewhere, that'd be cool. You can grab the code for the Made From Scratch Tuesday button on the top right of my sidebar.

Christmas #1 is Done!

Every year, we have three Christmases to get through. Christmas #1 is with the kids, #2 is just me and the husband, and #3 is with my side of the family. I'm happy to say, we made it through #1.

We started out with the stockings

 

She must have liked the pants because she wore them the rest of the day!

Soon, the in-laws arrived and we opened all the presents.

 

I guess it was too much for them; they all crashed!

 Now, for a peaceful evening and onto Christmas #2 with the husband!

Homemade Candy Canes

Call me crazy, but I did it. I actually made candy canes. I've never pulled sugar before, so this was a whole new adventure! The husband was on hand to help me out, which is a good thing because I don't think I could have done it myself.

I started out with these instructions. Just as a note, I think their picture is a little misrepresenting.


First, we got the sugar up to 280 degrees. (After doing this and reading several other recipes, I don't think that's hot enough.)

Note: Instead of following the eHow instructions, we put all the ingredients in one pan.

When the sugar reached the required temperature, I poured it out onto two heat safe cutting boards with raised edges to contain the sugar. We added a generous amount of red food coloring to one cutting board before pouring the sugar on.

Then we let the sugar sit until it formed a thin skin. At that point, it will be still be hot enough to work with, but cool enough to stick together. The husband and I each pulled a color. The white is actually clear until you pull it.

 

We figured out the trick to handling hot sugar. While I'm not proud to admit this, we stole the kids winter gloves then wore latex gloves over those. The knit gloves helped keep some of the heat off our hands and the latex gloves, sprayed down with Pam, made the sugar easy to work with without sticking to everything! If you can see in the picture, the husband is wearing the purple gloves with the pink hearts on them!!

To form the candy canes, we pulled ropes out of each color then twisted them together. The husband finally gave up on the gloves and suffered through the scorching sugar.

 

Even I can admit that our candy canes certainly were not pretty. Many of them were almost unidentifiable as canes! In fact, after seeing these pictures on Facebook, one of my co-workers commented on how you could tell which ones the kids made. Blushing, I shamefully looked up and informed her the kids were the photographers in this adventure. All the candy was made by myself and the husband. We all had a good laugh!

 

All in all, they were tasty, but I don't know if we'll be doing those again anytime soon! I did figure out that a few pieces of candy canes dropped into some hot tea is excellent!

By the way, did you know Indiana ranks 4th in peppermint production? The soggy soils of northern Indiana are perfect growing conditions for mint.

From the Farm Dinner

With the varied tastes in our house, it's very hard to find something we all like for dinner. One of our household favorites is breakfast for dinner.

 

We picked up our half a hog a week ago, and have been enjoying the tasty meat ever since! The sausage is amazing and makes the best gravy! (Oddly enough, I don't like gravy, but I can make it like nobody's business)

We get our eggs from my aunt. Let me clarify...we get our eggs from her chickens. You may notice they're a little more yellow than normal. We call them the radioactive eggs! 

You may notice that our pancakes are green. You see, in our house we don't do boring pancakes. Mostly because I don't like them. Yes, I do not like pancakes. I know, weird. Anyway, sometimes it's chocolate chip pancakes (which I DO eat because, well, they're chocolate) and sometimes it's strawberry banana pancakes. If I'm short on fresh fruit, we do colored pancakes. It's always a big deal on who gets to choose the color.  Being the lazy mom I am, I make it an all day competition. The kid who is the most polite all day gets to choose. Tonight, Thing 3 won the honor and we have green pancakes. It really does not take much to amuse these kids. A few drops of food coloring can make an evening. 

On another note, we finished up the Christmas tree last night.

 

 

Can you tell this house is ruled by girls? I found purple lights to match my purple beads this year, so obviously, I had to go buy pink and purple ornaments!! I'm trying to get into the Christmas Spirit for Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales. Check out those links to Overstock.com. If you find something you like, enter the promo code 121728 for 10% off all Overstock.com products or 202234  ** - free shipping promo code for electronics. 

Note:

All the ideas and opinions expressed are my own. No monetary compensation was received for doing this post, however, I was provided with a discount code from Overstock.com