Melted Snowman Ornaments & Exchange ~ 12 SuperMom Days of Christmas

One of my favorite parts of Christmas is reliving the traditions of my childhood.  My parents blessed me and my 5 brothers and sisters with many MANY traditions including an ornament exchange.  Every year we got together with a big group of cousins and traded ornaments.  I still have many of these hanging from my tree right now.  This year while decorating the tree my sweet 9 year old told me "Seeing my ornaments and hanging them every year is one of my favorite traditions!"  It melted my heart.  Which is a good lead-in for my Melted Snowman Ornaments we made for this years exchange, don't ya think?!!

I saw these sweet ornaments all over Pinterest last year and knew I'd make them for 'round 2013.  The materials are fun and versatile, putting them together was a blast, and giving them to the kiddo's 11 cousins was a big hit!

Sadly I don't have all my ornaments anymore because some broke.  So it was great finding plastic bulbs to use.  We gathered some little sticks for arms and the other snowman parts I found at JoAnne's.  Except for the little scarfs.  Those were made from a pair of old PJ's we were going to give to a smaller cousin (sorry Bradlee!) but I think the scarf-sacrifice was worth it  =)

LOVE the tiny fringe on the end!  Now somewhere on the ornament I really like to add the cousin's name, the year and who the ornament is from.  When we pull out the ornament box every year the kiddo's really enjoy seeing and hanging up

their very own ornament.

All items were placed into a muffin-tin for an assembly line process to put our snowmen together.  My little Kindergartner enjoyed separating out the white buttons from the black ones for the button eyes.

  I lucked out finding these fun carrot noses but I've also seen pieces of orange pipe cleaners used for noses or handmade from clay.  I really wanted to find a top hat but they were all too big to fit through the top of the ornament!

I was in charge of putting the Epsom Salt aka Snow into the bulbs then placed it into an empty spot in the muffin tin.  The kiddo's each had an item they were in charge of putting into the bulb, then passed the tin on to the next snowman-builder.  

12 times around and we had 12 Melted Snowman Ornaments!  I know I said earlier that we only had 11 cousins for the exchange but the kiddo's loved it so much I gave them the extra bulb I bought.  I saw an idea where flowers from a wedding bouquet were put into a clear bulb and loved it! (already purchased another bulb for my flowers)

They turned out fantastic!  Doesn't the Epsom Salts look like real snow?!  It was fun shaking the little guys and trying to get their parts to line up!  I kinda cheated when I opened this one up and poked a stick inside to move stuff around.  Hey, it was too cold to shake it until it was perfect!

Here are some of the ornaments the kiddo's got in exchange for their

Melted Snowman Ornament...

 We do our ornaments exchange at our big fat family Christmas party each year that kinda resembles one of my favorite movies that I have watched every year since I can remember (another tradition).  National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation.  Yep.  Griswolds all the way.  Matter of fact we had that movie playing at some point during the party.  It's a tradition after all!

Here are a few of my childhood ornaments.  

When I was moved out of my parents house my mom boxed up all my ornaments for my very first Christmas Tree away from home.  I cherished that box and all the memories that it held inside.  See that little desk, this is what it says underneath...

Now I know that ages me but without that written there I would never know who gave it to me.  It's a very simple yet special way to remember family members during this special season.

Now my Christmas Tree will never win awards.  It's a hodge-podge of ornament styles and colors, with handwritten notes on them.  But it is the epitome of what a Christmas Tree truly stands for.  It is adorned with love, memories and traditions that bring families together.  It. Is. Beautiful.

Tomorrow is my 12th Day and I will be sharing with you my most favorite family tradition.  Did I tell you we have MANY traditions?  I hope you stop by!  If you've missed any of the days, see them all here:

Keep Winter alive all year long....