Countdown to Christmas - Homemade Advent Calendar

 When my kids were younger, we decided to make an advent calendar.   We brainstormed a bit, and looked at our craft supplies.  We had been collecting cardboard tubes for crafting and thought they would be perfect for holding treats.

We painted the tubes in white, red and green, and numbered them with coordinating number stickers.  We stapled the bottom to make a little pouch.  If you do not have 24 tubes, you can use 12 and make them double sided.  After you add the numbers they are easy to embellish more.  We added stickers on each of ours. 

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We had an inner office door that had glass panes. We hung them on that door and then placed candy treats in each of the pouches.    Other options could be to add some ribbon and hang on the Christmas tree or garland.    An idea I had for this year it to make some that are Elf themed and have our Christmas elves Buddy and Joy bring one day. 

I am currently making Advent and Elf activity cards for my shop, which will be added this week.  The cards would fit inside the tubes with a different Christmas themed activity you could do that day.  I will be posting the link here as soon as it is up.  

If you would prefer to buy an Advent Calendar than to make one, I found some really cute ones online.  

If you love Marvel, this Marvel Pop! has a different characters in  each day of the month.  At the end of the month you would have a entire mini Marvel army to play with. 

 If you are a Disney fan, they have a  Funko Disney Character Advent Calendar

So many kids (and adults)  love fidget toys, they even have a Daily Fidget Toy Calendar, where each day you would get a new fidget toy.    They all look like fun except for the mini skateboards.  LOL I frequently had to temporarily take them away in class when my 6th graders got disruptive during the lesson.   If you make an homemade version of an advent calendar and want to add your own fidget toys, definitely check out the toy aisle at the Dollar Tree, they have lot of fidget toys. 

I wish they had this 5th generation Echo Dot for Kids when my kids were younger.  There are so many things you can do with this.  It will play songs, games and even help with their homework.  You will give a 1 year subscription to Amazon Kids Plus, and it has parental controls.  The kids can decide if they prefer this owl with owl voice, or turn it into a dragon with a dragon voice.  Definitely go check it out online, there is a lot cool features and a 2 year worry free guarantee.