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Our Advent Calendar

I am beyond excited about our new tradition! We made an Advent calendar this year and I hope we continue to do it every year. So simple! I covered posterboard in wrapping paper. I don't know about y'all, but I tend to keep gift bags, wrapping paper, ribbons and bows and re-use them. I haven't had to buy any in years.

After raiding my stash for a big enough piece, I wrapped the poster board. I purchased small change envelopes and numbered them 1-25. Then I filled each envelope with goodies. Cass is not a candy person, so each day she is surprised by stickers, hair clips, girly items like chapstick, small ornaments and do something cards. It was nice using the small envelopes because it limited me to small budget-friendly items. Really, you could use any size envelopes you want, depending on how large you want your calendar. 

I spent a lot of time growing up in the Sawyer/Cashman household and I vividly remember being at Nana's house and bugging Terri because Che and I were bored.  Terri, being the amazing teacher she is, gave us a do-something jar filled with slips of paper full of activities.  For the calendar, each do-something card has a holiday related activity. I thought of things we were already going to do, like Disneyland, and then planned ahead for things we want to do, like ice-skating and volunteering. This way we can budget and plan in advance what we're going to spend time doing and leave days open for spontaneous acts of fun too.  I taped the days and month to the calendar, then attached the envelopes and voila!

Each day Cass is giddy with excitement over what surprise the calendar will reveal.


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