Advent Calendar

I'm on a craft roll this week!  My house is still a wreck, but I'm getting some good projects done.  In the past my children have enjoyed marking the days leading up to Christmas on a little snowman calendar, but this year I wanted to jump on the advent bandwagon in hopes that a little focus each day will help us keep our minds on the Birth of Jesus this Christmas season. 

There are a million different techniques and great ideas for advent calendars out there, but I was putting mine together a little late and went simple.  Aja's cute calendar inspired me and I made a quick Hobby Lobby run for some paper and tags and got to work.

I had a 20x24 frame that I wanted to use and the spacing worked out perfectly.  I cut the patterned paper in 2 3/4 x 3 3/4 inch rectangles and then cut smaller red squares to glue on top of them.  Then I stamped the numbers for each date on top.

Using a scrap piece of mat board, I sprayed adhesive on the board and some burlap cut to size and then stuck the burlap down.  Then, using a mini-hot glue gun I ran a strip of glue down the sides and across the bottom of the rectangle to attach it to the board.

The tags were purchases at Hobby Lobby and I added some thin jute through the hole in the top.  This time I chose to only write messages on the tags rather than tucking treats inside...although some of the tags may contain instructions to receive a treat!

Finally I attached the board inside the frame and slipped a tag in each pocket.  Other than a great deal of cutting (thank goodness for my handy scrapbooking paper trimmer-that never gets used for scrapping any more!) this was an easy and fairly quick project.  I'm anxious to see how my kids react to a new activity this year.  I hope they look forward to checking it each day!

There are so many distractions this time of year that I hope this is a good tool to help us remember what's truly important and worthy of our attention.

P.S.  Happy Birthday to my sister Sarah!  I am so thankful for my youngest sis...she is growing into such a beautiful young lady who helps me with the "techy" stuff for the blog, loves decorating as much as I do, totally pulls off her own fashion statements, and is creative in the kitchen and a lover Star Wars and LOTR.  I love you Sarah! 

(and that's her cutie boyfriend!)