I SPY Christmas Ornaments

© Ranee Lyman Valentine and Pamela Squires 2008-2009

Each year at Christmas my children exchange homemade ornaments with their cousins instead
of presents. This year we made "I SPY" ornaments. Another 1st grader mom, Pamela Squires and I
came up with the idea, and she wrote the poem on the tag:

"I spy 2 snowflakes, a star from the night, A golden ring, and a Christmas light;
A holly leaf, a snowman, a little white dove, 2 bells, a present, and a heart full of love."

We are making them with our daughters' first grade class at their Christmas party on Friday.

They are super simple to make. I ordered the empty craft ornament balls (4-inch) off of eBay.
I then filled one side of the ornament with Polypellets (1 c.) purchased at Walmart.
I then put in 10 small Christmas-y items: confetti snowflakes; heart, holly leaf, and star beads, "gold" ring and tiny dove (from the bridal dept at Hobby Lobby), miniature Christmas light, and present (from Hobby Lobby's miniature doll house dept), 2 types of small bells, and a snowman button. I glued the 2 halves together securely*, tied on the tag and a ribbon, and that is it! They have been a huge hit.

* Make sure that the children can not open the ornaments.
The small items inside could be a choking hazard for young children.

Ranee Lyman Valentine

 

I SPY Holiday Cards

© Patricia Lipari 2009

I SPY...

Two super heroes and Santa with the boys; a horn to blow,
an apple, and Christmas lists full of toys.

A 5th grader, kindergarten for my baby (!) and trophies for two;
spiky shoes and oh-no-what-were-we-thinking, a puppy too!

A time for joy, a time for friends and family to be near;
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

It couldn't be just any old card... I mean, I work at Kodak, and people have certain expectations.
Then I read Jenny's post about her photo Advent calendar and Tom's post about his Christmas
cards through the years! But I had a case of writer's block. I scanned the internet looking
for inspiration.. nothing.

For a brief period I even dreamed of skipping cards altogether this year. Who would even notice?
Based on the feedback on my Facebook page, this was not going to be an option.

And then it came to me. My boys love reading I Spy books. I think we have every one. My youngest is
getting I Spy software for Christmas (shh, don't tell him). So I asked both of them to collect some items
that were important to them and told about the year they had.

We made most of the clues pretty easy since many people who get our cards might not be the
I Spy fans we are. But even my husband was stumped with the apple. See if you can find it.

Patricia S. Lipari
Marketing Communications Manager
CDG WW DC&D MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS