How to Make Moana Kakamora Coconut Ornaments

how-to-make-moana-kakamora-coconut-ornaments

Moana has been and continues to be both of my daughter’s favorite movie. Each of them is glued to the screen as the story unravels every time they watch it. Three thousand years ago, the greatest sailors in the world voyaged across the vast Pacific, discovering the many islands of Oceania. But then, for a millennium, their voyages stopped – and no one knows why.

The story of Moana goes through the history of her people and the reason why they never leave their island. As Moana takes off on a new adventure, we come to learn more about this missing pieces of her story and watch as she creates a story of her own. 

Throughout her adventures, my daughter’s favorite part in the movie is when Moana and Maui encounter the Kakamora. Seemingly sweet and gentle creatures in the beginning, Moana quickly learns of their fierce, warrior-like side. We’re recreating the Kakamora in these fun Kakamora Christmas ornaments for the holiday season.

Don’t want to make these yourself? Purchase one here in our Etsy store! 

how-to-make-moana-kakamora-coconut-ornaments-supplies

How to Make Moana Kakamora Coconut Ornaments

What you’ll need: 

What you do: 

1. Paint a circle around the edge of the wood slice with brown paint leaving the middle wood exposed. 

2. Using the black paint, make two circles for eyes. 

3. With the white paint, make a mouth full of teeth. Outline in black if you’d like. 

4. Add the final touches to the face by adding some designs with red paint.

5. Screw eye screw on top of the ornament and string with ribbon. 

Let dry and hang on the tree to enjoy during the holiday season! 

how-to-make-moana-kakamora-coconut-ornaments-on-the-tree

* This post was originally published on Nov 21, 2016

Homemade Cranberry Tealight Candles

Homemade Cranberry Tealight Candle

During the holidays I’m always looking for easy DIY ways to decorate the house. I also love any decoration that could be turned into a makeshift gift. After a little trip to Ikea I found these awesome larger tealight candles that are perfect for making my own candles for different seasons.

This homemade cranberry tealight candle takes a mason jar, some cranberries, and a tealight and makes it into so much more! If you have a few of these supplies lying around why not try your hand at making your own decorative candle for the holidays. Add a bit of twine and you have the perfect centerpiece or mantle display.

How to Make a Homemade Cranberry Tealight Candle

What you’ll need:

  • regular mouth pint sized mason jars
  • bag of cranberries
  • Ikea GLIMMA candles
  • twine (optional)

Homemade Cranberry Tealight Candles supplies

What you do:

1. Take lid off mason jar and discard flat disc.

Homemade Cranberry Tealight Candles take off lid

2. Pour in cranberries.

Homemade Cranberry Tealight Candles  pour in cranberries

3. Stop at the fill line right below the neck of the jar.

Homemade Cranberry Tealight Candles fill to below lid line

4. Place the candle on top of the berries. Make sure it’s flush with the top of the jar.

Homemade Cranberry Tealight Candles add tealight

5. Screw on the lid.

Homemade Cranberry Tealight Candles screw on cap

6. Embellish with twine, or ribbon, and enjoy your candle!

Homemade Cranberry Tealight Candles finished

How do you create a festive atmosphere around the holidays?

This giveaway is now closed!

thisorthatbutton

15 Santa Crafts

15 Santa Crafts - fun santa crafts to do during the holidays with or without the kids

‘Tis the season, for SANTA CRAFTS! I love love love doing Christmas crafts, so of course I have been on the look out for some cute Santa crafts, and boy did I find some. Below is a list of the CUTEST Santa crafts! I mean who would have thought, Santa hat chair covers?

Well obviously someone thought of it, and they super cute! I want them in my kitchen, like right now! From gifts to décor this list has it all! Enjoy and be sure to tell be below which ones you plan to try! I am thinking Santa hat chair covers, followed my Santa suit hand towels!

Merry Christmas and happy crafting!

 15 Santa Crafts

  1. Salt Dough Santa Ornament 
  2. Santa Treat Box (PICTURED)
  3. Santa Hat and Beard (PICTURED)
  4. Santa Stocking Holder (PICTURED)
  5. Santa Belly Jar (PICTURED)
  6. Santa Slime
  7. Santa Wreath
  8. Santa Footprints
  9. Santa Hat Decor
  10. Santa Gift Jar
  11. Santa Suit Hand Towels
  12. Santa Gift Bow
  13. Christmas Countdown Santa Printable
  14. Santa Hat Chair Covers
  15. Rudolph and Santa Ornaments

DIY Cricut Christmas Leaf Wreath Tutorial

DIY Cricut Christmas Leaf Wreath Tutorial

December is finally here and that means Christmas is literally weeks away. I love to decorate my home using my Cricut machine and being able to add such personality into my project is always a plus.

Today I’m sharing this DIY Cricut Christmas Leaf Wreath tutorial using a variety of Glittered Paper and Christmas Paper. Not only is it super easy to make, but it’s also one of the free designs that can be found in Cricut’s design space.

Hang it on a door, a wall or even the fridge and watch your guests stop and ask where it came from. This project was affordable and best of all so easy to make it’s even great to get the kids involved. Hope you really love this tutorial and will venture off to make your very own. It’s perfect for any place in the house! [Read more…]

SeaWorld Christmas Celebration: Creating Family Christmas Traditions

SeaWorld's Christmas Celebration - Creating Family Christmas Traditions

Last weekend we headed to Sea World to start a new family Christmas tradition. We were invited to attend a preview of the SeaWorld Christmas Celebration and boy was it fun!

With a whole line of Christmas-themed shows, real snow at SnowWorld®, beautiful lights everywhere AND Santa with reindeer games, our kids were in heaven. We let them plan the day out and gave them a list of the things we could do.

The best part was seeing the joy on their faces as they headed from one thing to another as they looked forward to their adventure. We’ll definitely be making the SeaWorld Christmas Celebration a tradition for our family.  [Read more…]

Soft and Chewy Gingerbread Men Cookies

Soft and Chewy Gingerbread Cookies

While everyone was slaving away on Thanksgiving making beautiful turkeys, preparing casseroles, and baking bread, my family was baking something else… gingerbread men and women! My husband is slightly obsessed with the holidays and asked the kids if they wanted to make some soft and chewy gingerbread men to take with us to Thanksgiving dinner. You know, to get in the holiday spirit!

After they baked them up they turned the reigns over to me and had me make the royal icing and decorate the men and women. We threw in some turkeys and fall leaves (not pictured) to round out the merging of the holidays but most purists around the dinner table grabbed for the gingerbread men and women.

Now that we’ve found an awesome recipe for the cookies it’s time to start planning what recipe we’ll be using for the houses we construct!
Soft and Chewy Gingerbread cookies platter

Soft and Chewy Gingerbread Men Cookies

  • 3/4 cup unsalted butter
  • 3/4 cup brown sugar (packed)
  • 3/4 cup molasses
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 2 teaspoons cinnamon
  • 2 teaspoons ground roasted ginger
  • 1/4 teaspoon allspice
  • 1 large egg
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 cup white whole wheat flour
  • 2 1/2 cups Unbleached All-Purpose Flour

Royal Icing

  • 1/4 cup meringue powder or egg white powder
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 3 1/2 cups powdered sugar (sifted)
  • 3/4 cup cool water
  1. In a saucepan set over low heat, or in the microwave, melt butter, then stir in the brown sugar, molasses, salt, and spices.
  2. Transfer the mixture to a medium-sized mixing bowl, let it cool to lukewarm, and beat in the egg.
  3. Whisk the baking powder and soda into the flour, and then stir these dry ingredients into the molasses mixture.
  4. Divide the dough in half, and wrap well. Refrigerate for 1 hour or longer.
  5. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Get out several baking sheets and line with parchment.
  6. Once the dough has chilled, take one piece of dough out of the refrigerator, and flour a clean work surface, and the dough. Roll it out as thin or thick as you like; for slightly less crisp cookies, roll it out more thickly. We go for 1/4 inch for a soft and chewy gingerbread man.
  7. Place the dough on parchment, and put a sheet of plastic wrap over it as you roll, pulling the plastic to eliminate wrinkles as necessary when rolling; this will keep dough from sticking without the need for additional flour.
  8. Cut out shapes with a cookie cutter, cutting them as close to one another as possible to minimize waste.
  9. Transfer the cookies to un-greased cookie sheets (or, if you’ve rolled right onto the parchment, remove the dough scraps between the cookies). Bake the cookies just until they’re slightly brown around the edges 8 to 12 minutes, or until they feel firm.
  10. Let the cookies cool on the baking sheets for several minutes, or until they’re set. Transfer them to a rack to cool completely. Repeat with the remaining dough.
  11. Decorate the cookies with Royal Icing.

For the Royal Icing:

  1. In a stand mixer or large bowl with electric mixer, add dry ingredients. Start the mixer and slowly pour in the cool water.
  2. Mix on low speed at first, increasing to high speed over several minutes. Beat until the icing is fluffy.
  3. Keep the frosting covered with a damp towel and some plastic wrap until you are ready to use it.
  4. Divide the frosting into smaller containers and mix with food coloring for several colors.

Soft and Chewy Gingerbread Men Cookies

What’s your favorite holiday cookie?

This recipe originally appeared on this site on December 1st, 2013

10 Holiday Stocking Stuffer Ideas from Dollar Tree

This post is sponsored by Dollar Tree.

Holiday Stocking Stuffer Ideas from Dollar TreeOne thing I absolutely love seeing my family open every year are their stockings. While Santa usually brings a few traditional items that are always included as stocking stuffers, he also throws in some fun goodies that the kids can play with and enjoy the morning of Christmas.

In an effort to reduce the amount Santa spends this year, we’ve decided to ask Santa for one big item each and then let him decide on a few smaller items for the stockings. So we headed out to one of my kids’ favorite stores, Dollar Tree, and checked out what they had in store for us this year.

And what do you know? We found plenty of awesome ideas for Santa! From board books, to dolls, do bugs and snakes, there was plenty at the Dollar Tree to keep my kids occupied. They even had stockings to purchase in case we didn’t have ours already. What a great idea for wrapping a gift!

Oh, and did I mention that for one of my family’s get togethers we’re planning on grabbing 5 things we love from Dollar Tree and wrapping those in lieu of our Secret Santa gift exchange? We’ll do it White Elephant style and everyone goes home with 5 new things! I can’t wait to go shopping and see what I find. [Read more…]

Holiday Baking with Land o’ Lakes Butter {Gingerbread Cake Recipe}

I am a member of the Collective Bias®  Social Fabric® Community.  This Land o’ Lakes butter shop and gingerbread recipe have been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias and its client.

Gingerbread cake - This gingerbread cake is not only full of spices and yum, it's also not overly sweet. It goes great with a nice cup of coffee or a scoop of ice cream.The holidays are here and my kitchen is in full gear for all of the holiday baking that’s going to be done over the next two months. Luckily I stocked up on butter and the rest of my needed pantry staples so that I can whip up whatever I need when the time comes.

Since I’ve been hosting quite a few playdates I wanted to test out a great cake recipe that wasn’t too sweet. My husband and I love baking and the number one rule in our home (and a little inside joke with the husband) is that our fridge can never be without butter.

While we were at Walmart picking up a few crafting items for my daughter’s upcoming birthday I jokingly asked my husband if he was sure we had butter in the house. He sighed, rolled his eyes, and ran to go grab a 4-pack.  [Read more…]

DIY Popcorn Garland with @JollyTimePops

Jolly Time Popcorn Garland

 Getting Creative on a Budget: How to Make DIY Popcorn Garland

Getting crafty and creating items to decorate your home can be pretty daunting. And sometimes it gets rather expensive! But this DIY popcorn garland is neither daunting or expensive. So pop up your kernels on the stove and lets get to it!

[Read more…]



© A Crafty Spoonful - All Rights Reserved
It is OK to use one of my photos provided a link back and/or proper credit is given. It is NOT ok to copy and paste a whole post including instructions. Please do not remove watermarks or alter images in any way. Please contact me with any questions at danielle@acraftyspoonful.com

.