The 9th Day of Christmas

Nine Ladies Dancing



Todays gift was 2 Christmas music CD's (for the Ladies to dance to)



Card:



Poem:

Nine ladies dancing would be too big a crowd, 

Besides their music is way too loud.

We have for you Christmas songs,

That you can listen to all season long.

The 8th Day of Christmas

Eight Maids a Milking



The 8 Maids a milking were new at there job.
Try as they may they just couldn't get the milk to come out right.
Instead of plain milk, they got chocolate milk and milk duds.

Card:



Poem:

With a few changes -

On the eighth day of Christmas, we're busy as a bee. 

While the Eight maids-a-milking, no where do we see. 

But thankfully there in the barn we spy a tasty sweet, 

Chocolate Milk and Milk Maid caramels, what a treat.

The 7th Day of Christmas

Seven Swans a swimming



Tonights concept was that the Seven swans were swimming and playing in bubbles before they flew south. Therefore, the gift was bubble bath.



Card:


Poem:

I changed the last two lines of the poem I found at the above link and came up with this:

The 7th day of Christmas and we are half way done,
Remember no peeking or you’ll spoil the fun.
On this day of Christmas, how nice it would be,
If seven swans a swimming your family could see.
When we arrived at the pond only bubbles were there
but the swans left a note saying they were eager to share

The 6th Day of Christmas

Six Geese a Laying



Tonight I made Chocolate Eggs that the geese left when they flew south.
I found the idea here

You melt white chocolate or Almond bark then add a yellow center to look like an egg. The above site said to drop an M&M in the center but I didn't get that it was only 1 until just now. I wasn't sure how you got the M&M's to all melt together smoothly. Also, thinking I used more than one on each "egg", I wasn't sure how many bags of M&M's I would have to buy to get enough yellow ones, so I just used yellow sprinkles instead. They turned out really cute. I forgot to take a picture of them before I packaged them up but you can sort of see in the above picture.

Card:



Poem:

Six geese a-laying -- an interesting sight.

One of them squawked and they all took flight. 

What they left in their nest, 
you'll just have to look, 

But with these you won't want to cook.

The 5th Day of Christmas

5 Golden Rings



Todays gift was a tin of butter cookies and some bracelets for the girls and a bracelet pen for the boy in the family.

Card:



Poem:

I decided to go with my own creation tonight because all the previous days had started out with "On the ____ day of Christmas" and Zac's poem tonight didn't. I was kind of torn though because I liked his poem but I didn't want to bother him to add to it since he was busy editing pictures.
So in the end I wrote my own.

Here are the two versions:

Zacs:

Five golden rings would be nice,
the way they shimmer in the light
But sparkly bracelets shimmer too,
and cookies just feel so right

Mine:

On the fifth day of Christmas we sing “Five golden rings”
So a box of golden cookies is part of the gift we bring
Also for the kids, we must insist
they wear these “rings” around their wrists

The 4th Day of Christmas

Four Calling Birds



Before the cell phone age, the gifts for this day were traditionally calling cards or cash for the pay phone but since that doesn't work now days, what to do for the 4 calling birds?

I liked the pen and paper idea I found in this poem .

The calling birds have all flown away.
They're visiting the South to see the view.
Instead of a call, they left these few things,
Some pencils and paper – their gift to you.

However, I didn't like that the lines of the poem didn't rhyme like the previous days did so I inlisted Zac's help again and he came up with this:

On the fourth day of Christmas, four things you will not miss
A bunch of calling birds and the mess that certainly comes with
Instead a pretty box full off paper and pens for all to share
A slightly boring gift I hope still manages to say, “I care”

I was slightly offended by his "boring" comment but in the end decided to leave it because it was something Zac would say and I want these gifts to be from all of us. This was part of his contribution. He also is the one who delivers the packages each night while everyone else is fast asleep in our beds. Zac just isn't wired to go to bed early so I know it is safe for him to make the delivery trip before he goes to bed.

Last night before I put the gift together, I was making chocolate chip cookies and didn't have any baking soda so I had to make a quick trip to the store. While there, I found this little box that had 4 birds on it "perfect"!
Ok technically it has 5 birds if you count the one on the ground.
But either way, I knew it had to make its way into this gift!



I filled the little box with several different pencil and paper gifts. The green and black pad in the back has a hole in it that you keep the pen in - I almost bought one of these for myself as well. Then for the kids I found a little box of paper, stickers and colored pencils and Cars pads that came with pencils as well. Also I added a little pad of paper that had a magnetic closure and was printed with ornaments and the word Noel on the front.

Don't forget the card:

The 3rd Day of Christmas

Three French Hens



Most of the idea I found for today were for chicken noodle soup, or cornish hens. But then I saw something about a coffee mug with french vanilla coffee mix. I loved this idea and wanted to find some sort of chicken/hen container or dish and a vanilla drink mix to combine some how.

I came across the above pictured tin at Hobby Lobby and knew it was perfect! But, what to put in it?
So I searched the drink isle at the store and found French Vanilla Hot Coca Mix. I then picked up a few packs of regular milk chocolate hot coca mix as well and added a bag of marshmallows to top it all off with. Then packaged it all up with some red tissue paper and the printed card.

Card:




Todays poem was challenging to write. I'm not know for being gifted in cleverness when it comes to writing. So after many attempts, I took my ideas to Zac who quickly came up with the perfect ending.


Poem:

Night 3 arrives, but we are not it France,
And three French hens don’t come by chance.
In fact in this gift, true hens there are not,
But what there is that is French is enjoyed while its hot.