Advent Ideas

As a child, I remember having those chocolate calendars that now you can buy for super cheap and are filled with gross, waxy, cheap chocolate (gee, can you tell how I feel about those now?) At least I remember a year or two of those. I remember better, though, my mom making an advent calendar for our family (and then for the families of all her siblings) and filling them with treats and activity sheets for the whole month. We have an advent calendar that I made for Z a couple years ago at a church event, which has little pockets that I can fill with small treats. I can't really fill it with treats, though, since our little sweetheart has a sweet tooth and has, on more than one occasion, helped herself to the days ahead.

I found a few ideas that could solve our little problem of not being able to wait for the day to come to have another yummy treat.

 This lovely little idea has me intrigued, little reusable links at Stitch-Craft. Found via Ohdeedoh. I love the idea of creating traditions by doing activities together as well as having our children look forward to a family activity instead of just a piece of chocolate. I'm just trying to figure out how we make it work as part of our routine and don't end up forgetting. Roxanne at Craft Addictions has a great starter list of advent activities that you can include in your calendar.

Also, Amber at giverslog.com has a great post full of advent ideas. I love her family tradition of hanging an advent wreath, chandelier-style over their table.