Time capsule ornaments

I cannot take credit for this idea, but I loved it so much, I just had to do it myself and share it here on the blog! I picked up clear glass ornaments (the fillable kind) from A.C. Moore on sale last week and had so much fun with these! I wrote all 3 kids' names on the ornaments with a paint pen, along with the year.

Angel really got into this craft and helped me fill all of them with glitter and a few toys. We picked items that represented each child individually - Angel picked a few small girly toys for hers, we picked some crayons and moon dough for Lovebug, and Sunshine got a small hair clip because she loves having her hair "done" right now.

I then cut a small piece of scrapbooking paper for each ornament so that we could list all of the kids' favorite things right now. The family that originally gave me this idea lists all of the big milestones of the year instead ... I bet there's tons of ways to do this fun part! Angel wrote her own, which is so exciting to me because I know it will be so fun to look back at her handwriting in the years to come. Once we were satisfied with our lists, we rolled up the papers and stuck them inside the ornaments also.

Lastly, I printed a recent picture of each kiddo on regular old copy paper (I know, very hypocritical of me but I needed them to bend so they would roll up and fit in the ornament). Once we placed them in each ornament, they were complete and ready for tree hanging!

I am thrilled with how these crafty time capsule ornaments turned out :-) It will be such a fun tradition to create these every year as the kids grow older, and look back on them as well to watch them change through the years. This one is definitely a keeper! I'd love to hear about all of the awesome traditions that you share with your family too, especially the handmade ones! What fun memories to make for our whole family :-)

In other off-topic news, our house has had a rough couple days (or weeks if you count all of the other sicknesses too). Sunshine has bronchitis, Angel has a bad stomach virus and I am sick with a yucky cold (or something) again for the 3rd time in 6 weeks. DH may be starting to show signs of the stomach thing as well ... it is a very nasty virus that has left Angel completely incapacitated all day today and unable to keep anything down. Lovebug is the only one that is semi-healthy, and even he has a bit of a cough. Poor Sunshine has been sick and/or recovering from surgery for a month and a half. Apparently being under general anesthesia makes you more prone to pneumonia ... thank God it's only bronchitis so far, her lungs are clear! I feel like we just keep passing everything back and forth to each other ... I am almost starting to worry if sleep deprivation is contagious as well, because we all seem to be suffering from it. Honestly, it's quite laughable at how sick we all are! Hopefully we can wipe all of this yuckiness out over the next few days before Christmas. Fortunately we are ready for the weekend's festivities, so the only thing we need to worry about is getting well!