Remember those wonderful chocolate advent calendars you had growing up. They were fun, but kind of boring right? You were so excited to wake up and bust the window open just to find yet another piece of stale chocolate probably from 5 years ago. I knew when I had kids I wanted to celebrate the countdown to christmas but I wasnt sure how. My Sun for the past 2 years has gotten a Playmobil advent calendar. First the stable then santas workshop, beautiful sets with fun pieces to add to our growing collection of Playmobil. Now that little Star is 2 its time for her to join our countdown, there was no way I was purchasing 2 Playmobil calendars. I thought of making our own with little toys but again didn’t want 48 junky, random toys around. Browsing Pinterest I found some really neat ideas for building your own calendar. Using gifts tags hanging and turning each one over, using multiple sized gift boxes stuck to a board (I really liked this one and thought about doing it). So yes there are tons of ways to make your own. I found this beautiful wooden advent tree at Superstore. It was the last one and I knew it was perfect, I just had to decide what to put in it. After purchasing wooden ornaments and realizing they didn’t fit I decided on an Adventure Activity Advent Calender.
Every box is filled with an activity or adventure. Lets see what day one had in store
Wow the kids were excited about this one and even though it was pouring, really, really pouring, we bundled up and had a wonderful time. We even saw Santa! oh I forgot to mention, I also found a neat felt tree advent calender at the thrift store and while Sun reads the activity, Star checks a felt pocket for an ornament and puts it on the tree. Ill add a picture of that as it fills up.
This is us right before we headed out the door.
The setting for the craft fair was this beautiful, hundred year old farmhouse. This place is called Providence farm and it is a therapuetic community where they grow vegetables, do therapuetic riding and have wonderful events.
They had a wonderful Candy cane forest on the way to Santas workshop that was throughly flooded but we skipped down the path like we were in Candyland. It was magical.
We saw these wicked purple berries.
Santa was in his workshop with his elves. Another magical moment, Sun speechless and just staring like he’s seen… well… Santa! He could barely tell him what he wanted. Star was a little shy which is definitely not like her, we all sat together and got a picture which I will post when I get it.
Day 2:
Yay! Eager to get started we were baking cookies by 9:30 am. We call the Pillsbury cookies with little pictures on them Daddys cookies because he usually buys them and ingests most of them.
For how terrible these cookies are for us the sure were good. Mmmmmm. They were gone by about 11 am.
I can’t show you the wonderful masterpieces we made today as they are gifts for friends and family but I can tell you that I found a tile painting craft kit from Winners. The kit includes 3 different size tiles, paint, stencils, magnets and a book of ideas. It was $12 and will allow the children to make at least one for every family member we gift to plus some for friends. Every year we try to make some gifts, we have done flavoured cooking oils, coloured and scented bath salts and a cinnamon and milk bath. One of my favourite gifts we made was personal magnets. I took pictures into walmart and printed them as small as possible, about half the size of wallet size. We cut them out, glued them to cardboard and added a magnet to the back. Every one got personal magnets of our favourite pictures. They are still on our families fridges and will be for years. This year I have a few gift making activities added to the advent calendar. It’s not too late for you to get started on your own advent calendar adventures! Personalize them for your family but some ideas are:
Wrap Christmas Gifts
Get Christmas tree
Go skating
Talk about Winter solstice
Make ornaments
Go on a family hike
Go sledding
Roast marshmallows on your fire and drink hot cocoa
Drive around and see Light displays
Make paper chains
Watch Christmas movies
Grocery shop for food band
You get the Idea.
Have fun and I would love to hear some of your adventures.
Another way I decided to countdown is with an advent candle, I made it tonight totally last-minute. The candle I found is a little bent but still beautiful. I marked it with permanent pen and every night at dinnertime we will burn our candle and talk about our day. Another great way to keep the excitement going and really make this time of year special.
Now off I go to peak at tomorrows activity! I’ll update this post daily so make sure you check back to see what adventure we were up to.
Day 3:
Beautiful cards were made for us by Sun and Star. There are lots more ready to ship to our family and friends. Some have stickers, some have artwork some are worked on by both others just by one. Little Star also made a card for Shanta (as she call him).
Advent Day 4:
A simple and classic decoration, easy enough for both kids to help. Day 4 is make paper chains.
Day 5:
We used to live in this Quaint little village called Cobble hill. Every Christmas in the local grocery store they would set up a Village Display with all the little lemax light up buildings and cobble stone paths. In leading up to setting up own village I thought we would drive out to see the display.
After school we all loaded into the car, daddy included, and drove out to Cobble Hill. When we arrived we were surprised to see not a village display but a Gingerbread house display! Very neat. Houses covered in cookies, candies, shredded wheat, little tiny reindeer. Not the village but very much worth the trip. I have a picture of all the wonderful houses but its on Bs phone and ill add it later when I add tonights activity….. there was a little foreshadowing for this one.
The Spotted Owl 