Creating a Family Advent Calendar

It is only November, but we have been discussing Advent calendars over the last couple of weeks.  They all spied the chocolate ones in the supermarket the other day and were demanding to know what sort they would be getting this year. I don’t blame them, once the Advent calendars are out, the great Christmas countdown begins and it does add a certain bit of magic to the whole month of December.

Over the years, we have dallied with many different types of Advent calendars; chocolate ones of different types and sizes, Playmobil, LEGO, trying each year to have something different.  I have often looked at the lovely wooden Advent calendars that you fill yourself with special festive treats; something that would be reused every year, becoming as much a tradition as the other decorations but they can be quite expensive.

One thing I had never considered was making my own.  My craft skills are relatively limited but when I was asked to decorate a wooden Advent Calendar from Hobbycraft, I couldn’t resist.

Hobbycraft sent us their Santa Truck to work with and the children couldn’t wait to get started.

I must admit that at that point, I was torn between letting them have a go and doing it all myself but in the end, we all chipped in a did different bits and we had great fun doing it.

If I did something like this again, I would invest in acrylic paint, we used our normal paint and although it works quite well, I think acrylic paint would look much better.

We are pleased with the finished result.  It isn’t perfect but it has been made by us and I hope that it will be one of those things that we get out each year and say; “Do you remember when we painted this?” For me things like this make really happy Christmas memories.

 We were sent the Santa Truck for the purpose of this post.  All opinions and images are our own.