Happy Christmas Charlie!

I was pretty broke this year so I made all of the kids' presents. We haven't opened Adrian's yet because he's been sick, but hopefully we can do that tomorrow!

This is her taggie ball. She has a matching taggie blanket too. She's not sure what to make of these. I made them because I thought we could just loop her fingers in the taggies and she could maybe try to bring her arm up to see it. So far, she has just stared at them. LOL

This was her reaction to the elmo Live doll a friend gave her. She was absolutely *thrilled* with it!

See her big grin!? It's nice to see her getting back to herself after her last illness. She was going on 2 weeks with not one smile. :-(

Her care bear dress. I made her two dresses with matching hats and bloomers.

Babylegs! Yeah I know they don't match, but we were just trying it all out. ;-)

And her other two dresses.

All of this was made from stuff I already had. Total I spent less than $25 on xmas and that was including the tree, lights, ornaments, and wrapping paper.

Adrian is getting a complete doctor dress-up outfit with a matching bag filled with extra medical supplies, a teddy bear with a gtube (he lost the one from his baby doll), and a badge that says "Dr. Adrian" on it. I made him misc clothing items, a ball like Charlie's except without the taggies, a whole playdough set (homemade playdough, rolling pin, cookie cutters, a playdough mat, and a bag to keep it all in), and a bunch of candy in his stocking. So I'll have to post a lot of pictures later!

The best part about opening Charlie's presents was she actually seemed to enjoy it. My mom was holding her and helping her rip the paper. She liked the crinkly sound and she got SUPER excited about the elmo doll. Her eyes lit up when she saw him and she smiled really big when we turned him on. Then I handed elmo to my friend so he could take him out of the box so she could play with him and she whipped her head around to him and would NOT take her eyes off of him and kept saying "Ehhhhh! Ehhhh!" until he finally got him out of the box and handed him back to her. LOL I have video of it, but no way to get it off my phone here at my mom's house. That will have to wait until later.

If you ever feel crappy that you don't have the money to buy your kids expensive gifts, just remember that they usually just end up playing with the wrapping paper anyway. So do a quick search on the internet of what you could make at home they would really enjoy and tell yourself you are doing them a favor by not spoiling them with materialistic crap. I sewed a lot of this stuff and I realize not everyone can do things like that, but I also came across a lot of cool stuff that does NOT require any sort of talent. The playdough was beyond easy to make. I will post the recipe later, but it is all stuff you probably already have at your house and it takes about 10 minutes and wasn't messy at all. Even if I'm in a better financial situation next year I want to do this again. It made me feel very good and I know that when they are older, they will not appreciate hand-made stuff as much (what teen wants to wear a hat his mom knitted for him!?).