Advent Calendar Ideas
Celebrating the holiday season with an advent calendar is an important part of the holiday season in my family. There are so many fun ways to carry out this tradition in your own home from the open the door for the piece of chocolate variety (Hard to beat Trader Joe’s version!) to a wall hanging you stuff yourself with daily gifts or activities. There are even Lego, Playmobil and other surprise toys options that make daily countdown to Christmas exciting for kiddos of all ages.
In our house we have tried several different styles, but I thought it would be fun to try crafting one this year, and this clothesline of little packages is what I came up with. I stuffed them with small candy little notes of activities for us to do each day. With this style each box can include enough for my three kids and they all take turns opening. We have found that the anticipation is bigger and more exciting when they have to share the same advent. The little notes are simple things like having cocoa, setting out special Christmas decorations, or reading special holiday books together. Some years, with kids activity schedules, these family activities are hard to pull off for our crew but one of the blessings of 2020 is so much less to be rushing to and from offering more family time, therefore, the perfect opportunity for this type of advent.
1) Print the Advent Printable Cards (purchased from Etsy) on white card stock & cut out each individual square. I added a white square of paper underneath the printed square and attached the picture with foam tape to create a little dimension.
2) Select coordinating cardstock and cut 25 of the small tote box designs with Silhouette Cameo electronic cutter. I used this mini box pattern, pulled out the included decor elements, and sized the boxes so I could cut 2 boxes on one piece of 8 1/2 X 11 inch paper. I chose something colorful but there are other options for both printable cards or card stock to make yours feel personalized. This could also be done with store bought boxes or treat bags if you do not have an electronic cutter to work with.
Other silhouette advent designs that would be fun to use are this milk carton boxes, advent Christmas tree, advent house, or 12 day countdown design.
3) I used craft glue to glue to boxes together and fun red & white crafting twine to tie them shut. I arranged them on this clothesline frame that Cindy (although you can use the link to purchase one) made for me years ago and has become one of my favorite ways to display my papercrafts. If you don’t have something similar, the little boxes are adorable and could stand alone without the clothesline frame.
4) You can stuff the little boxes any sort of small things:
Small candies - Andes mints, Hershey kisses, mini candy canes, etc.
Lego or Playmobil pieces - we have broken us larger sets and put a few pieces in each day so that by Christmas the design can be completed.
Holiday jokes (a big hit with our kiddos)
Holiday book titles that you can read each night. (Twelve years into parenthood we have collected more than 25 holiday books that all my kids are thrilled to read year after year. When Scout was little, I found quite a few very inexpensively at a thrift store and then try to add to our collection each year, below are some of our favorite titles, click on the photos for ordering information.)
Once you start to collect your own set of holiday books, you can incorporate them into your holiday advent. I know that this year when we aren’t able to do the ice skating, holiday gatherings, Santa events, and holiday parties, having this collection of books are going to bring a lot of joy. They could even be wrapped with numbered labels so that a different special title is enjoyed each night.
Here are the boxes hung with white clothespins in the frame. I tried to make the colors random, and incorporate non-traditional holiday colors, but you could make your own advent boxes in any color combination. The natural paper boxes look really adorable with all of the colors in the labels.
There are so many adorable Advent options! Check out some of our favorites on Etsy. Some of these are personalized, some DIY kits, but they are all a fun way to celebrate the season and super adorable. Click on the photos below for product and ordering information.
**As Etsy, Meri Meri & Amazon Affiliates, we earn with qualifying purchases.
