Comments on: Amanda Blake Soule’s Creative Home Work

By: Anisa

Anisa — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 14:17:28 +0000

Congratulations to Hillary from Ithaca, NY. She won a copy the Amanda Soule’s book. Thanks to everyone for sharing their holiday traditions or their pledge to start or create your own. Inspiring.

By: Jen

Jen — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 05:16:26 +0000

Thank you Erin!

This book has caught my attention a few times this week!

I look forward to celebrating the shifting of seasons and honoring mother Gaia’s gifts of the earth with my 3 children…We look to honor the light in all~

Blessings~

By: Kathleen S

Kathleen S — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 17:43:16 +0000

We try to teach our 2 girls about cultures around the world. We attempt to pick a country (or a city) of daughter’s choice, and we go to library and check out books about culture — what they wear, play and eat. We have a dinner, and try to pick out attire and accessories that are fitting. We do a craft. We download music from iTunes that is appropriate, and we cook a family meal with this culture in mind. We don’t do it every month, but every so many. It is a fun way to connect with the world.

By: Laurie H

Laurie H — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 03:37:38 +0000

Over the past year my 5 yr old has made about half a dozen receptacles out of clay to “put matzoh crumbs in” for various Jewish holidays. Of course I’ve never said to him that we don’t need such a thing! I cherish his participation.

By: susan b

susan b — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 13:43:33 +0000

I love Amanda Soule and read her blog daily! Thank you! susan

By: Julianna

Julianna — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 12:32:51 +0000

Great interview Erin…and as always, thanks for all the stories on your blog!

My favorite holiday tradition is to turn off all the lights (save for the xmas tree) and turn up Celine Dion’s Christmas CD. I’m not typically a fan of hers, but there are a couple tracks on that album (oh holy night is my favorite…but ave maria and another one with Andre Bocelli) are STUNNING! My kids are too young to sit through it, but my sister tells me her boys have adopted it as part of their tradition. (Also – I wanted to share my sister’s holiday tradition of an “activity” advent calendar…each day the boys get a treat such as this lights-off-Celine-Dion time.)

By: Lisa Tener

Lisa Tener — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 19:58:37 +0000

We celebrate a little of everything–Hannukah, Solstice, Christmas. Every solstice, my mother-in-law holds a potluck at her home. Friends and family come and we sing holiday songs around a bonfire on her beach.
When my little one was an infant, and the next year when he had pnemonia, I stayed with him at the house during beach time. This year, I am excited to join the bonfire again!
Wonderful interview–it made me think about adding more creative time to our days with simple activities. Our boys love to create things together, like collages, and I often just don’t think of it in our busy days, especially if I’m trying to squeeze in work editing a client’s book manuscript or book proposal, or writing in my blog. The article inspired me to start a creative activity with the boys today–I’m off to find fun materials for collage.

By: Hillary

Hillary — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 16:02:28 +0000

We love to decorate our home with natural treasures we find on our family hikes. We will bring pruners with us and bring home boughs and the children love finding a bare bush filled with red berries to accentuate. This year I want to collect pine cones and hang them from the boughs over our front door with ribbons.

Something we just did yesterday for Thanksgiving was create a gratitude chain. My four year old helped me cut out strips of colored paper and we went around the party asking people to reflect and write down what they were thankful for. We then stapled the pieces together to create a chain and put it on the dinner table as a centerpiece. After dinner we had fun reading them and guessing who wrote what!

By: helen

helen — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 22:41:13 +0000

my very FAVORITE family christmas tradition is writing in ridiculous names in the “from” portion of the gift tag. the ridiculous name is a clue to what’s inside. for example, if the gift is snowboarding socks, the name will be some hiedous blabbermouth we met on mountain on a vacation in 1998. or if it is a giant chocolate bar, it will be from someone who hoards chocolate secretly, but we all know she is doing it. it is really, really funny. maybe you have to be there. we try to outdo each other. i love it.

and i want to win that book!

By: elyse

elyse — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 19:55:14 +0000

in our home, we celebrate both christmas and hanukkah and i sort-of borrowed from some other traditions to make the jewish holiday our own. each night of hanukkah, i fill small shiny bags (fancy gift card bags with drawstrings from beloved target) with spare change and gold chocolate coins. i hide one for each boy in a room of the house and we play “hot-cold” with the boys as they try to find them. we do these nightly after lighting the candles and there are no gifts exchanged. my boys love doing this. after they chew on their chocolate and count their money, it’s usually on to “battle dreidle!” (we even have a theme song — think: transformers!)