There are so many fantastic festive traditions that we get to enjoy each Christmas. From holiday desserts and Christmas flowers and festive lights, decorations are made to spruce up your home both inside and out. One of the best traditions of all is that of the advent calendar. Giving your children something to enjoy each day as Christmas approaches. If you don’t have one, you can make your very own calendar with just a few basic items.

When you need to make an advent calendar:

  • Beaded garland approximately 9-foot long
  • Green and white cardboard
  • Glue
  • Scissors
  • 12 small Christmas globes
  • 1 large Christmas ornament
  • 12 pairs of Christmas socks in different sizes
  • Floral wire
  • 24 safety pins

How to make your advent calendar:

  • Start by unpacking your socks. It’s great to use two different sizes or alternate between colours just to add some variation to your advent calendar.
  • Cut circles out of your cardboard so that your white circles are slightly smaller than the green ones.
  • Use the glue to stick the white circle to the green background circle. You will need 24 of these.
  • Now write the numbers 1 to 24 on each of these circles. You can also decorate them even more using glitter and other accessories if you like.
  • Unpack your socks and arrange them in the order that you would like them to appear on the advent calendar.
  • Use safety pins to secure the numbers to each sock.
  • Now use the floral wire to secure each sock to the garland.
  • Add some small decorations in between your socks and you are all set!

Hang your advent calendar on the last day of November or on 1 December along with the rest of your festive decorations. Even if you don’t put your tree up yet, you can still embrace the holiday spirit from the beginning of the month of December with this calender. Make sure that you add a special gift in each sock for your child or children to enjoy. Even if you don’t have children, you can include a gift for your spouse for each day. These are supposed to be small gifts and they can even be sweets or chocolates. If you have more than one child, you can include two items in each sock. Just make sure that they are identical so that there are no disagreements! Alternatively, you can make two calendars – one for each. Again, make sure that they receive the same or similar gifts each day.