Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Gifts for good monsters, and other brainstorms from Santa's workshop


What do you give your good monsters?

Here's what mine will find beneath the tree:
The bag is inspired by Tickle Monster, by Josie Bissett, illustrated by the talented Kevan J. Atteberry.

I got happy-growly about monsters when I won the art lottery recently - Kevan J. Atteberry sent me a gorgeous monster print which I'm framing up for Sugar Snack's room. Thank you, Kevan!

More of our monster book stash:


The Sea Serpent and Me, by Dashka Slater, ill. Catia Chien

Sylvia and Bird, by Catherine Rayner 
(of my delicious fave Augustus and His Smile, raved about here.)


The girls helped me sew up the book bag.

See that red pom-pom tail?

They say you teach a man to fish and he feeds himself for life, right?
Well, I taught them how to make pom-poms.
They are set for life.
They can make fake snowballs and luggage tags
and monster tails.  Who needs college?
And we are deluged by little ball-y pom-poms and yarn bits
on every surface.
ad infinitum.


The elves have also been helping to make gifts.




Gifts for our paleontologist pals: 
dinotopeancils. pencilausoars...

...dinosaur pencils.
(involving plastic toys, pencils, a drill and glue.)


Gifts for our writerly / readerly crowd:

button clips 
(paper clips meet buttons. The girls also made some to sell for "market.") 


Gifts for our dolled-up gals:


Hair button-ups. 
(same idea: buttons meet bobby pins.)

and


personalized paper doll cards. 
(I will put up a link for the free printable version of this soon.)



Gifts for lonely doors:

an art project I did with the girls' class - 
Holiday Wreath, Revisited
(involving sticks and yarn. shazam!)


Here's to happy, lovely, contended growl-y moments
this holiday season for you and yours!



More beast-y books, and what we're reading around the house:

The Friendly Beasts, illustrated by Tomie dePaola
The Nutcracker, by E.F. Hoffmann, ill. by Maurice Sendak
One Candle - Eve Bunting, K. Wendy Popp
A Little House Christmas, by Laura Ingalls Wilder, ill. Garth Williams
The Shine Man, Mary Quattlebaum, ill. Tim Ladwig







8 comments:

Colleen McCall said...

I still have the book you printed in second grade. The paper dolls reminded me of them. When Abel gets home from school I'm going to have him make me a wrapped stick wreath. I love all your ideas. BFF

Martha Brockenbrough said...

Faith, you are SO AMAZING!!!

Love to you and the whole clan from the Bees.

Dawn Simon said...

I agree with Martha! You are amazing! I love seeing all the fabulous things you do with your kids. Love it! That bag is so adorable! And the pom-pom fun, kid pics, dinosaur pencils, paper doll cards--it's all so great!!

More blessings and joy to you in 2012!

Faith Pray said...

Colleen, I can't believe you still have it! I hope you know that having an artist as a best friend at our small age kind of pushed me over the edge into this world. It's even more inspiring to see what you're up to now! Wahoo, Colleen!

Faith Pray said...

Aw, Martha! Happy holidays to your sweet bees!

Faith Pray said...

Dawn, thank you, thank you! And a beautiful 2012 to you as well!

barefoot mama said...

wow, you are really creative and this blog ROCKS!

Faith Pray said...

Thank you, barefoot! I hope we will get to visit more in the comments - or your blog? I didn't see a link on your info...

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