December Daily 1

Today was the first day of the December Daily journey.  A photo a day in order to document the good, the bad, the memories and the mundane all together which encapsulates a month in my home.  The challenge -- I love it!

Today I switched out our Advent Calendar activity cards (much to the chagrin of two eager boys) because I added a few more "make it more meaningful" activities for them to partake in and new family traditions.  I'm quite excited about those.

Would you like to see what we are doing in the Driggers family?  Here is a copy of my cute little Advent Cards.  It has an action, a movie and the first 12 the tie-ins for the song the 12 Days of Christmas and they also have (bottom right hand corner) the order of the alphabet for the little book we do. Sweet, simple.  Happy!

Grab a copy for your very own here, and here.

ADVENT Bonus Printable

I wrote a little poem to go with each letter of the alphabet.  Print this.  You can roll up each day like a little scroll and tie it with some Christmas ribbon and then place it in their advent envelope or you could simply work on them all month long.  But, if you start today, you should be able to finish by Christmas and have an amazing little keepsake at the end.

Get your own clean printable copy here.  

Basically what happens is that you print the booklet, You can either cut the pages in half and give them one a day but you'll read the little rhyming word on the bottom and then draw a photo to correspond.  The real treat in these is when you can star when they're young and see how their skills grow as they age.

Day Three - ADVENTure of Christmas

In an effort to streamline your ADVENTure activities, I have created some printables for you to use.  All you need to do is simply print, cut and use them how you wish on your ADVENTure!  

The first thing you need are some countdown numbers to attach to whatever you are using to count down your days!  I'm having technical difficulties on my laptop getting the new to save as a .jpg file so you can see the font, but the style and layout is the same as below.

Printable Advent Numbers can be downloaded here.

The next thing you'll need to do is figure out what you want to attach them to.  What I like to do is to purchase the SMALLEST plain kraft colored gift bags I can find at my local craft store.  They're usually 3/$1 at Hobby Lobby.  I simply glue the number to the front, insert the activity cards inside and enclose a sweet treat for the day.  Sometimes I buy a big box of mini candy canes and put one in there for each kiddo.  I have all of our bags placed beside our second Christmas tree. 

So, ideas for the advent presentation...I've seen some really cute ones, some elaborate ones and some that are just completely over the top.  Mine is so simple, doable in just a matter of minutes and voila. Complete.  Others are awesome but somewhat time/labor intensive.  However, if you're up for a crafty challenge, check out some of these:

I have no idea who to give credit for this (left) but I love the random, earthy feel of it.  Red, white and kraft colored display.  It's tied on a branch that looks like it's hung with baker's twine to two nails.  S-I-M-P-L-E and beautiful!  You can't beat that!









Parent's Magazine (below) posted this one that's a fun, easy andcolorful way to celebrate.  Cardboard, toilet paper tubes that have been halved, tissue paper and glue.  You supply the inserts, obviously, and probably some stickers for the numbers.  again, another one that is easy and fun!  Don't overthink these!


A Bubbly Life featured this advent calendar. I love how fun and whimiscal it is with the red pompom noses attached to the plastic animals that have all been painted white.  She gives step-by-step instructions on how to make this one.  Plain kraft boxes with stenciled numbers -- easy, yet impressive presentation.  Beautiful job. 



Another colorful way to use up some random colored envelopes means you're not only repurposing but also able to recycle when it's all over!  Stickers, envelopes, advent activity cards and a little painter's tape make this a quick and easy decoration for the wall -- always great when you're short on display space!  Find instructionshere.  (Featured above).









For those awesome people out there that can sew (I sadly am not one of them), Smile and Wave created this adorable felt advent calendar (featured right).  Instructions can be found here.

I have to admit I get a little jealous seeing things like this... that green-eyed mom-envy monster rears its ugly head because it's SO DAD-GUM cute!  Trillium Design created a tutorial for this bad boy.  



This one is absolutely adorable, doable and again, you're able to repurpose everyday items for an awesome experience.  Mindy Pitcher is the artist of this beautiful creation.  You can find it here. It looks like full sized toilet paper rolls that have been rolled in tissue paper and have the edges sealed after they were filled and then have a printed paper wrapped around and secured with a number attached.  This, too, doesn't take up a great deal of space.  Yay for that!

On the left is one of those advent calendars that would cause me to take major pause at the even remote idea that I could actually accomplish something so completely adorable.  Boxes, tags, stamps, texture and surprises!  It's a recipe for a winner!  Come check out Stampin Jill.com  To the right is another Pinworthy creation made by Honey We're Home (HWH) and you can find instructions here.  Truly adorable. 


I like the idea, too, of just a simple box to open as well.  I Can Teach My Childhas this awesome advent creative box delivery method.  It does help keep everything universal which allows you to realize your limitations for size and such.

So as you can see, the delivery can be as simple as colored envelops or as elaborate as you want to make it!  We did envelopes the first year and graduated to the little gift bags.  They're just fast, I can reuse them and they're functional.  I see no reason to fix what isn't broken.  

So now that you have your calendar printed, dates blocked off for engagement you've already made, as well as class and work parties; you've created a list of books and movies that you want to incorporate into each day as well.  Now it's time to start narrowing down your choices by day so that you can have full action activity cards.  

You need some of those, too?  Well, the list that I created in this post, I made some printable activity cards for.  So you need only print, cut and add them to whatever you are doing for your advent container.

You can get the full list here.  Print, cut, enjoy!

Happy New Year! Let's Get Organized for your day! It's time for the Lists

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Well, it's the first day of the new year... and man it's been a doozy of a day for me.  Crohn's.  Sucks. 'Nuff said.

However, with the "down" days, I still try to do, plan, be organized and present.  Today is no different.

With the new year comes the new year's resolutions.  As I've stated time and time again, I am not a resolutions maker.  Why?  Because people tend to make them... screw up once and have the mindset of "well, I gave it a go."  Then they go back to their old ways of doing whatever it was they were attempting to change silently thinking "failure" in their mind.  What a way to sabotage your motivation!

Friends, I'm here to tell you the ONLY time you FAIL is when you QUIT!  Or stated differently by someone I highly admire...

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I've loved some of the meme's I've seen about that very thing... quitting over one hiccup.  Ya just don't need to do it!  

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I'm always fascinated by the idea of resolutions for the new year.  I don't really understand WHY people feel the need to wait for a whole new year to make positive changes in their lives when they have the option to do that EVERY.SINGLE.DAY.

Aren't I just a ray of sunshine?  

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I'm thinking of the typical new year's resolutions I hear (in no particular order)

1) lose weight
2) stop smoking
3) stop drinking
4) eat healthy
5) get fit
6) further education
7) further career (raise, promotion, etc.)
8) take a trip
9) get out of debt
10) get organized

So, HEY, if you're on the resolution bandwagon and need the motivation of a new year (which is here now) and want help to get your groove on and plan your a new, blank slate... your time is now!  And aren't you lucky?  That's what I'm here to help with RIGHT THIS VERY MINUTE!  

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The easiest place to start with any of your resolutions is by getting organized!  Why?  Because you can't do any of the other until you actually accomplish that goal.  I'm not talking about having color coded bins with all of your children's socks matched, your garage floor squeaky clean and have homemade cleaners whipped up to make your house eco friendly (although, that is coming, if you're interested).  I'm talking about simply starting out your day with a plan -- an organization of your time, if you will.  

Unless you're a freak of nature, it's not common to wake up ready to roll with a mental list already made, whittle away that list, forget nothing, stay on track, manage all the curve balls thrown at you and feel accomplished at the end of the day with all your i's dotted and your t's crossed with your gold plated calligraphy pen without missing a beat.  If so, you could just BE Batman.  But, I won't have that preposterous notion floating around in my head so we will focus on the fact that we need to get you organized!

And, lucky you!  It's a new year.  You have a clean slate so let's move forward with that momentum to get you a plan.  The key to everything is to use that momentum to make this into a habit.  Once it's a habit, you've worked yourself into your own personalized plan.  So, simply stated, to start out -- you need a plan.

There are TONS of systems out there... but if you're like ME, they're never just quiiiiiiite right for you.  How do you go about having a system in place when you can't find a plan you can use straight out of the (proverbial) box?  Well, if you're anything like ME -- you MAKE one!  I'm not one for conformity anyway.

So it's time to break out your ole pen and paper, grab a cup of something delicious and let's get started! 

There ya go... pick a pencil... any pencil. 

I like to start out simple and grab a pencil and a spiral binder.  It's a GREAT tool to start working on making your plan.  It's new, clean, lined paper just waiting for a list!  The very first few pieces of paper are going to be the guide to the rest of your life.  I'm serious.  Take those pages and across the top of the first several ones, write the following headings:

Daily

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

Friday

Saturday

Sunday

Weekly

Bi-Weekly

Monthly

Bi-Monthly

Quarterly

Semi-Annually

Annually

Can you guess what comes next?  That's right, you get to have a major brainstorming session of the things that you WANT and HOPE to accomplish during each one of these time periods over the next few days.

This is YOUR MASTER list.  YOU know where YOU live and when things happen in YOUR life so you're not going to be dictated to when something wanted something done because that's when it's printed on your planner.  You're going to put it on YOUR planner because THAT is what works for YOU!  See? I just can't roll with the other.  I don't like or appreciate people telling me what to do when.  I like to be in complete control.  

So, because I do, get to as well!  Yay us!  I kind of feel like we should be running in with arms pumped in victory because this will be our plan!  It will be good!

Keep that motivation running.... let's start today with a Printable Daily Docket you can get here.

I'm telling you, you will want to add this snappy shirt to your yoga pant ensemble and you will DESERVE IT!  

So, start your "DAILY" brainstorm... What are things that you have to do every day no matter what.  This could be something as simple as "take your medicine" or "walk the dog" or "check the mail" or "do a load of laundry"... "set dinner out to thaw"... "journal"... "feed and water the dogs"... "tolerate the cat" (Hahah!  I'm not a cat person).  But this list... this DAILY list should contain things that you want to do on a daily basis regardless of the day of the week.  

I've seen plans written out "make bed" on the daily list.  Me, personally, I really don't need to waste the space or devote the time to make sure that I check that off of my list because when I get out of bed, I pull my covers up.  It's already an engrained habit in my head requiring me no reminder.   However, I'm REALLY bad about taking my vitamins at night so I DO keep that one on there as a visual reminder to do what is needed.  If you are one of those people who needs the extra nudge via a check box and reminder, to make your bed or to help you establish a HABIT so that it becomes second nature and part of your permanent plan, by all means, throw it on the list.  You're certainly not going to offend this girl.

Record your daily goals or goals you HOPE to establish this year to do on a daily basis.  

Tomorrow we will work on specific weekday assignments.

Get listing people!  There's a method behind my madness... want to know why I do what I do?  

Because at the end of the day, I want to hold my children's attention longer than I hold my phone.  I want the relationships I foster to be ones that are tangible.  While my friends on Facebook matter to me... they are not the ones that need my attention.  My family is and so by creating a plan of action, everyone's needs will be met and I will feel accomplished, satisfied... and... dare I say it... super!

And just because we're talking supers.... this is more my style.  :)  Just sayin;