DECK THE HOLIDAY'S

   This comes from www.celebrationsathomeblog.com .  Try these for a different twist at your next holiday party. Nothing says Holiday nibbles to me, like a dish full of spicy nuts! This recipe is perfect to have sitting around the house during a party or on Christmas day while you’re waiting for your big meal. It has just a hint of sweet and a hint of spice and has proven to be a tried and true recipe. I like to have a small dish of nibbles on the bar too as you see here , and this is my go-to snack! Try making these today – I bet you have all the ingredients in your kitchen already! Spicy Pecans 2 egg whites 1 1/2 teaspoon salt 3/4 cup sugar 2 Tablespoons Smoke Paprika (or regular) 1 1/2 teaspoon ground red pepper (cayenne) 2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce 6 cups pecan halves 1/4 cup Plus 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted Beat egg whites and salt with wire whisk until foamy. Add sugar, paprika, red pepper, and Worcestershire sauce, beating well. Stir in pecan

   This comes from www. cremedelagems.blogspot.com  .  Would make a lovely ornament on your tree for the spooky little ghoul or ghost in your house.  OOOOHHHH! Jack Skellington Ornament B O O! It's Jack Skellington... as a Snowman. Please allow time for all photos to load :) Have Fun! As always, if children will be doing the creating, I recommend they use Bake Shop Clay by Sculpey ; however, any Sculpey brand Polymer Clay is safe for children. Polymer clay can be found in your local craft store. Remember to keep all sharp tools away from children. Read and follow all package directions on the back of your polymer clay packaging.               Condition (squish & soften) clay before using & wash hands between using each color. afterthought... Warm Jack up by wrapping his neck with a scarf made of wool felt~ I also think Jack would look just as cute with only his head and santa hat ;) xo

   Ethiopia (and especially the Ethiopian Orthodox Church) still use the old Julian calendar, so the celebrate Christmas on January 7th, not December 25th! The Christmas celebration in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church is called Ganna. Most people go to Church on Christmas day.    Many people fast (don't eat anything) on their 'Christmas Eve' (6th). At dawn on the morning of Ganna, people get dressed in white. Most people wear a traditional garment called a shamma. It's a thin white cotton piece of cloth with brightly colored stripes across the ends. It's worn like a toga. If you live in a big town or city you might wear 'western' clothes. The early Ganna mass starts at 4am!    The Ethiopian capital city is Addis Ababa. It's a modern city. Most people who live outside big cities live in round house made of mud-plastered walls which have thatched cone-shaped roofs. Sometimes houses in the country are rectangular and made of stone. The design of

   During Christmas in Costa Rica, people like to decorate their houses with beautiful tropical flowers. A model of the nativity scene, called the Pasito or Portal, is the center of the display. It's also decorated with flowers and sometimes fruit. Some of the scene take a long time to make and all the family is involved. As well as the traditional figures, people add other models including houses and lots of different sorts of animals. Christmas wreaths are made of cypress branches and are decorated with red coffee berries and ribbons. Most homes, shops and important buildings are decorated with Christmas lights.    In Costa Rica, the gift bringer is often 'Niño dios' (Child God, meaning Jesus) or 'Colacho' (another name for St. Nicholas).    On Christmas Eve, everyone puts on their best clothes and goes to Midnight Mass. In Costa Rica it's called the 'Misa de Gallo (Mass of the Rooster); it's also called that is Spain.    After Midnig

This diy comes from www.twigandthistle.com .  Make this ahead of the Christmas season and your children will enjoy finding what little treasures and candies lie beneath the lids of the holiday tin advent calendar. Magnetic Holiday Advent Calendar DIY    UPDATE: Wow, and I thought I was being so clever, Martha beat me to it by a whole year! Check out her version ! The long Thanksgiving holiday is the perfect opportunity to get started on some of those Christmas crafts you’ve got planned. I started a little early this year so that I could share this little project with you and I hope you enjoy. Some of my fondest holiday memories from childhood were around the advent calendar. My grandfather would mail us one every year and I can remember how excited we were every day to open the tiny doors to see the surprise inside! Typically chocolate but sometimes a small trinket or toy. This project is a new take on the traditional advent calendar and one that will easily last f

This diy comes from www.afieldjournal.blogspot.com . These would make great paper ornaments also. Peppermints & Candy Canes These candy gift tags were an assignment I did for HobbyCraft , a UK publication. The story was unfortunately cut at the last minute, but I wanted to post some of the photos now that it's Christmastime. To make these, gather colored card stock, scissors and glue. Use the template to cut out the shapes and assemble as shown. You can add crepe paper "wrappers" to the peppermints, by gluing an additional paper circle to the back of the tag, sandwiching gathered crepe paper pieces between the layers. As a final touch, I dusted the finished tags with crystal glitter. Use these to embellish a package or decorate the tree!

   Christmas in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is more of a religious festival than being commercial. Most people won't have any presents.    Christmas Eve is very important with Churches having big musical evenings (most churches have at least 5 or 6 choirs) and a nativity play. These plays last a very long time. They start at the beginning of the evening with the creation and the Garden of Eden and end with the story of King Herod killing the baby boys.    People taking part in the play really like to show off their 'best' acting skills and tend to go over the top and 'ham it up'! King Herod and the soldiers are often figures of fun (like pantomime 'baddies') and Mary is often well advanced in labour before she arrives!    The birth of Jesus is timed to happen as close to midnight as possible and after that come the shepherds, the wise men and the slaughter of the innocents. This means the play normally finishes about 1am. However, i

This comes from www.sweetopia.net .  Very cool looking and very delicious! Christmas Cake Pops                           I have to start this post out by thanking Angie at Bakerella . If you haven’t heard of her, she is without a doubt, the queen of cake pops – having blogged for years as Bakerella and having published an excellent book on making cake pops. The instructions in her book are fantastic – she covers every detail from the basics on how to make cake pops of all kinds, down to how to ship and store them. I’m pretty sure she has played a major role in the cake pop craze sweeping the globe too! Her book’s thorough instructions made these Christmas cake pops easy to make for the holiday issue of the LCBO’s Food and Drink magazine. (Yay! I was so happy to be asked to make the pops for them. Btw info. in index and photo on pg. 29). If you haven’t seen Food & Drink , it’s a Canadian magazine dedicated to the art of entertaining, including the latest rec