DIY Advent Calendar

Tired of buying advent calendars with tiny chocolates in them every year?  Me too.  Not quite ambitious or crafty enough to create one of those elaborate 24 envelope or 24 boxes advent calendars that are all over Pinterest?  Me either.  Here’s my in-between.

Grab a piece of sturdy cardboard (ours is 15″x21″) and 12 toilet paper tubes.  Yeah, we’re all about reusing around here so we had all this on hand.  If you don’t have any saved up yet, that’s okay.  Just tell the kids that you’re saving toilet paper tubes and they will never throw one out (or let you throw one out) again!  They might even change the toilet paper when it is out just to get another tube!

Oh and glue, tissue paper, a marker, tiny elastic bands, spray paint and acrylic paint in whatever colors you fancy (we went with a white and green theme).  Start by cutting the toilet paper tubes in half with some scissors.  They might flatten a bit, but that’s okay.  Then use your glue to coat the cut edge of the tube and place them in a tree pattern (or whatever you like!) as shown below.

Now……wait.

Grab a cup of coffee or fold some laundry.  That glue has got to dry.

When it is dry, spray paint the whole thing.  I didn’t coat ours incredibly well because I like the way it kind of looks like snow.  Now wait again.  Pick up where you left off with that book or unload the dishwasher.  See all the things you can get done while crafting?!

Time to grab that tissue paper and start cutting. You’re going to need 24 circles, roughly 3 1/2 inches in diameter.  It just needs to cover the hole enough that you can secure it with an elastic.
Label each with numerals 1 through 24.  And you’re done with the crafting part.

 Now the fun part!  What to put inside each tube?  The beauty of this is that it can be different for everyone.  We chose to have one calendar for our two kids to share.  You might want to make one for each.  Because we share the calendar, on days when I put candy inside there are two pieces.  Which means they need to be small, so I generally use Hershey Kisses or Rolos.

Other days I put in folded papers with an activity that we might do together or that they should open a gift from under the tree. By now the kids know that there are some gift and activities that they get or do every year, so they start to look forward to them.  They always open a gift with new Christmas pajamas and another with a new Christmas book.  For activities, we always make gingerbread houses one day and watch a Christmas movie (in the afternoon!  What a treat!) with hot cocoa.

Some new activities for us this year will be baking cookies to deliver to the neighbors (shhh) and making old fashioned popcorn balls.  Cover each tube with a circle of tissue paper and secure with an elastic.  Let the kids pop away!

This has become a beloved tradition in our home and the kids so look forward to it.  Have you created new holiday traditions in your home? Do you carry on some traditions from when you were a child?

Health and Happiness,

Cerissa