Advent in Hot town, summery in the city - 2017

I get self satisfiedly excited at this time of year as I create the girls ‘ advent calendar.

When T was 1 I bought a fabric advent calendar kit and sewed it, creating 24 pockets (there are actually 25 but one has no number on it) in which to put advent gifts. When they were little the girls were happy with cheap pieces of crap; bouncy balls, finger puppets, mini kaleidoscopes etc… but as each year goes by it gets harder.

We’ve done years where each day had a kindness task (bake for the neighbours, buy goods for the food bank etc…) and another year where each day had an activity (go for a winter walk or have hot chocolate and cookies etc..). We’ve done positive affirmation cards for which I bought the girls an album each to keep them in.

This year I have gone with buying things from local crafters on a local Facebook page; the same page on which I’ve been selling my masks. The girls have hand made chocolates, book marks, Christmas tree decorations, soaps etc… and other things. I also ordered some crystals online. That was a fun palaver! I ordered some petrified wood (one piece each) and some shards of rough (ie non polished) selenite. I received two opalites and two HUGE chunks of rough selenite!! I managed to replace the opalite for the petrified wood (in fact, I was allowed to keep the opalite) but i decided against querying the selenite. It looks lovely up to the light and feels really calming.

There are also various pieces of jewellery in these plus some bog standard supermarket chocolate.

I think when they grow up and leave home the advent calendars will be one of the things I miss most about Christmas with them. So much fun, so little materialism and the thing they mention most on the lead up 🙂

I shall try to remember to share a photo once it’s done.