Bird Tree Decorations

Ella and Dani did a lot of snacking

 I opted to go with these birdseed ornaments from Saltwater Kids as well as classic peanut butter pine cones, and popcorn strings.  This morning I packed up Dani and a bunch of supplies and headed off to my friend Amanda's house to get crafting.

birdseed gelatin mix...yummy?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

First we started off with the molded ornaments.  The kids enjoyed spooning the mixture into the cookie cutters, but their favorite thing was placing the straws that kept the holes open for a hanger.

At first I thought maybe I should mix up a double batch of the birdseed mixture, but I'm really glad I didn't!  We ended up with a dozen ornaments from just the one batch which was more than enough with all the other things we had planned.  I also have to mention that these things are tough.  I knocked the pan of half-dried ornaments off the top of the Learning Tower and they didn't break!  I was shocked!

she might look serious, but she loved filling the cups up

Dani was really taken with filling the orange-half baskets.  They were probably the easiest thing we made and still fun for the kids.  The downside being that they birdseed all ended up in the floor when I knocked over the tray...but we swept it up and refilled them easily enough.

We decided we'd leave the peanut butter dipping to us adults and the birdseed rolling to the kids.  We mixed a bit of oil with the peanut butter to thin it a bit (don't overdo it though, you don't want it too drippy) and then laid out a cookie sheet of seed for them to mess with.  We couldn't get the pine cones dipped fast enough for them!

Ella thought they might be tasty

and this is only half of it!

In the end we had quite a pile of stuff and the kids enjoyed it all.  Amanda and I agreed that we were actually more excited about decorating the trees for the birds than we were about decorating them for the holidays.  Is that sad?

Tomorrow we will be decorating the tree outside once the ornaments are fully dry.  Daylight will also help of course.