Solstice

I feel like I've been counting down to Christmas since July (I blame Pinterest), and now that the Thanksgiving leftovers have finally been dealt with, I feel ready to really get my jingle bell on. Let's start with our Solstice celebration invitations, shall we? (I call it Solstice because we talk about the seasons and welcoming back the light, but really it's just an opportunity to craft with the childrins and feed them and their parents too much candy.)

I found these plain wooden tubes at the craft store more than a year ago. I thought I was going to use them for Dash's birthday party invitations, but the Universe had other plans.

The tubes were delivered to each guest stickered with a "classified" warning and a postmark from the North Pole.

Shall we take a peek inside?

BOOM! We finally infiltrated Santa's operation and got hold of the Nice List.

And here it is. Our guests found themselves listed among such other luminaries as Mr. Harry Potter and Ms. Pippi Longstocking (who just squeaked by). 

(If you're interested, the Nice List was made by dipping sheets of legal-sized paper into cold coffee, letting them dry and then running them through the printer. I laid out two copies of the list on each sheet, and then cut them in half lengthwise to make a thin scroll. Does that make sense?)