The Kindergarten Fast Track
I played with glue and scissors and ribbons and fake flowers on Tuesday! Yes, that’s right, arts and crafts! I love arts and crafts. I wish I was actually good at them, but really, I’ve just got a bit of a proficiency at using a glue gun. I can tie mediocre bows, I can’t cut fabric to save my life, and I have a hard time picturing something when I try to make it. But that glue gun – I’ve got that skill down pat.
The past couple Tuesdays, Mike’s sister Kate and I have been going to church to make arts and crafts projects for the church Christmas Faire. (Speaking of which – if you want to go to the Christmas Faire, it’s on December 3rd pretty much all day. Ask me for directions.) We showed up this week with several bags of goodies.
REWIND!
After the football game on Sunday, Kate and I took off for her favorite place on Earth. I’d ask you to guess, but unless you know her, you’d probably have a difficult time. So, I’ll tell you. It’s the Christmas Tree Shops. Yeah, the girl loves Christmas. Not that I don’t love Christmas, just that she loves Christmas. She actually has had to put a stop-loss on her spending at this crazy store. She “only” allows herself to go once a week.
So, there we were, at the Christmas Tree Shops. At least it was a Sunday night, and before Thanksgiving, so it wasn’t super-insane. As soon as we walk in, Kate spots something that excites her greatly – a light-up turkey centerpiece thing. She immediately picks it up for her aunt, who is hosting Thanksgiving this year. At this point, I realize that I’m in for quite a ride.
We went up and down every aisle (except for the furniture section – who needs furniture) looking at all kinds of trinkets and gadgets. We were on a mission. The previous Tuesday, while we were helping out with the Christmas Faire things, the basket people didn’t have enough little things to put in baskets. That had to be fixed, so we each picked up a couple… a few… a dozen… okay, a few dozen little bits and pieces: Christmassy picture frames, kitten picture frames, poker picture frames, decks of cards, toenail care kits, teapots, tea, soap dispensers, hair ties, matchbox cars, day planners, gardening things… Basically, we got one of each. And if it was really cute… two or three.
FAST FORWARD!
So grabbed our Christmas Tree Shops bags and Kate took her craft bag, and we went inside. We met up with a lady we hadn’t met last week, who was sorting various bags of donations in the downstairs hall. We helped her carry various bags of stuff upstairs to the Sunday school classrooms.
Upstairs, we found the ladies we were crafting with the week before. We dropped off our basket goodies, and went into the art classroom to start assembling Christmas ornaments. The sense of urgency was minimal, and Kate and I just started making parts and pieces of this cute angel that her mom taught her to make. Kate wound string around a CD case while I cut the buds off of tiny little fabric flowers. Then Kate kept winding string (these things require a lot of string) while I cut up bits for halos and wings. Assembly time came, and some of the other ladies kept “oohing” over Kate’s fabulous angels.
While we were working on these, several other ladies and a couple young girls were assembling baskets for the silent auction. The kids were sitting next to me in chairs that were too small even for their twelve-year-old frames, so I took more interest in what they were doing. They put together an awesome basket of painting supplies from an area paint store where one of the girls’ dads happens to work. They hot glued ribbons onto baskets, deftly avoiding burning their fingers. Later, they were packing little doggie treats into little stockings. Christmas is full of adorable things.
The time went by too quickly, as we gabbed away through our three hours of assembly. Soon, it was time to pack up and go home. We weren’t done, but we had made about 14 or 15 beautiful angels. We’ll have to figure out how to hang them as ornaments next time we go craftify.
As we were leaving, we chatted for a while with some of our fellow crafters. We talked about the town, about the church, about the local newspaper, about life in general. They are such nice people, and I really am blessed to be able to spend time with so many awesome people. I haven’t loved church like this in so long, and I don’t think I ever had so much fun with church.