My Front Porch Looking In: An Advent Calendar

Happy Tuesday!

We are coming off a jam packed week/weekend. Saturday was the ladies’ event at church that I told you about. It was lovely, as always, with gorgeously decorated tables and FANTASTIC testimonies. I wish you all could have heard them!

I think my table came together nicely and as requested, I’ll post some pictures later this week. I never set a “formal” table at home so I had a lot of fun doing it!

Sunday evening was our kid’s Christmas program at church. And of course, Lily pulled her skirt up in front of the entire congregation and Sophia refused to wear her headband. They are constantly redefining my idea of what constitutes a “perfect” moment…I love them!

With this being the first full week in December, I thought I’d share our Advent calendar along with some of the things we have planned.

You may remember that last year, I started an Advent calendar…the key word being “started”. It never did get finished last year. {This is basically the story of every single DIY project I have ever done.}

So in September of this year I decided to get proactive and finish it up. It’s basically just canvas drop cloth sewn into squares. I used stencils and some red paint to put numbers on the front and hung it on our railing with clothespins and twine.

The idea is that each pocket will have a slip of paper in it telling what our special Advent activity for the day is…24 for each day in December leading up to Christmas.

Now…I know. Twenty four is a LOT. And I really didn’t want to cram our calendar full and stress out about getting all the activities done, because that just takes the fun out of it.

So I will tell you that most of these are either A) things we already had on our calendar or B) very simple. We did this last year too so I just slightly modified the activities to fit with our calendar this year. And in case any of you are thinking about trying something like this for yourself, here’s our list to give you some ideas {the “BOLD” ones include links}

1. Decorate the Christmas tree

2. Go to the Christmas program at church

3. Set up nativity scene

4. Drink hot cocoa in front of the fire

5. Open special present (I made them a felt Christmas Tree and ornaments like this one)

6. Drink eggnog and read the story about the birth of Jesus

7. Open your special ornament and put in on your tree

8. Go to the Bass Pro Shop’s Winter Wonderland and visit Santa

9. Read a Christmas book (The Light of Christmas)

10. Do a Christmas puzzle

11. Make a craft with Mom

12. Read the story behind the candy cane and eat some