DIY Advent Calendar

12/01/2014

It’s that time of year again. With Christmas just 24 days away, I thought I would share my super simple DIY Advent Calendar. It’s easy, fun, cute and a great way to avoid sweets and presents – because don’t we get enough of those as it is?

The Advent Calendar works great for toddlers, preschoolers and children of any age as you can simply cater the activities and good deeds you fill your calendar with to your child and his or her age and ability. It could even be a fun thing to do with your partner if you are expecting or have little ones who are too young to partake quite yet.

My DIY Advent Calendar

You need:

Christmas Craft Paper, Ribbon or Paint

Twine

25 Clothespins

25 Mini Envelopes and/or Mini Burlap Sacks

Number Stencils

Glue, either craft glue or hot glue

Scissors

Tape

Black Sharpie

How to:

I’m not much of a planner and tend to come up with the best projects when I wing it. So these instructions are merely suggestions based on what worked for me, which was based on the materials I had at home. Keep in mind I finished this project at 12:30 am last night. I’m a last-minute DIY mama.

1. Start by cutting enough twine to hang nicely from one end of your mantle to the other. It’s not fancy, but I used a few pieces of clear tape to hold the ends of the twine on the top of the mantle on both sides.

2. Prepare your clothespins by either cutting various patterns of coloured Christmas craft paper to fit on the top of the clothespins, painting them Christmas colours and/or cutting Christmas ribbon to fit them. I used 13 different patterns of Christmas craft paper and repeated each once then hot glued them on.

*A pair of tweezers is handy to help avoid burning the tips of your fingers.

3. Clip the clothespins on the twine so they are spread out evenly, approximately 3 inches apart.

4. Prepare your mini envelopes by stenciling numbers 1 to 25 on the bottom right corner of each envelope. You may want to use pencil first and then go over each number in black sharpie. If you are using mini burlap sacks you may need to stencil the numbers on white cardstock, cut them out and hot glue them onto the bottom right corner of each sack.

5. Hang the envelopes and/or sacks in numerical order from 1 to 25.

6. Fill with fun activities and good deeds.

Advent Calendar Filler Ideas

I don’t know about you, but I’m not a super fan of the idea of my toddler eating a pile of chocolate each morning or receiving a gift every day. So I decided to include 20 envelopes filled with activities and good deeds and 5 burlap sacks that I will fill with small items, like gum (she’s obsessed), tea, toothbrushes, etc.

Here are some ideas for fun activities and good deeds to fill your advent calendar. I wrote each activity on a small sheet of Christmas craft paper:

• sing karaoke in your pjs
• build a snowman
• go tobogganing
• have a snowball fight
• go out for lunch to a restaurant of your choice
• watch your favourite movie
• movie night/afternoon out with mom & dad
• have a tea party
• bake your favourite treat
• paint a Christmas memento
• make a Christmas ornament
• do a Christmas craft
• take food to the food bank
• visit the animals at the SPCA or Humane Society
• donate toys to a local charity
• put up the Christmas tree
• put up the Christmas lights
• decorate a mini tree for his or her room
• go to Candy Cane Lane
• go for a hay ride
• go to a Christmas Play
• go to your favourite play place, i.e., Java Mama, John Janzen Nature Center

These are just a few ideas for you. I strongly recommend being strategic about the activities you put in each envelope based on the day of week, the weather, your schedule, etc. Don’t feel the need to have your whole calendar filled all at once.

This advent calendar is a great way to teach your little one the value of time spent together and the value of giving to others.

Have fun!

~chelsey