How To: Make An Advent Calendar

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If you don't have your Advent calendar prepared yet, you are almost out of time. Thankfully there is a cute, quick, and easy way to make your own Advent calendar!

I hate the wall color in my living room, but I'm too lazy to repaint a rental house. Too bad the paper bags blend in!

You Will Need:

1. Ribbon.
2. 24 paper bags.
3. Push pins.
4. Paper clips or clothes pins.
5. A pen or numbered decorations up through 24.
6. A gift for all 24 days.
7. Scrapbook paper.

Decide how many bags you want in a row and then cut your ribbon long enough to accommodate them. It's easiest if you use multiples of 24, but you can divide it however you like.

Attach the ribbon to the wall using a push pin on each end.

Number your paper bags 1 through 24 either using a pen or your numbered decorations. In my case I found scrapbook paper with numbers on it and cut them out to create my numbered decorations.

Put a gift in each bag.

Fold the top over twice and rest the fold over the top of the ribbon. Attach using a paper clip or clothes pin. Do this for all 24 bags.

Using your scrapbook paper create a page that says Advent 2013 and another that says December 25th, or Merry Christmas, anything of the sort. Pin the first page to the wall above your paper bags and the second one to the wall below your paper bags. Ta-Da! You are done and ready for December.

The beauty of this Advent calendar is how versatile it is. If you don't want to do it for a whole month you could call it "The 12 Days Of Christmas" and just have it the 12 days leading up to Christmas. If you don't have time to decorate you could use paper bags, some twine, and a sharpie to create a functional Advent calendar. Or if you like to craft you could really go to town and stamp and emboss these. Make it your own and enjoy gifting to your loved ones!

I made this Advent calendar as a surprise for my husband, so I can't post what the gifts are yet or I will spoil the surprise. I will post them each day as he opens them to give you some ideas for your own! Since you don't have to have all 24 gifts right from the get go (some of my bags are still empty) you can take a bit of time to go shopping throughout the month so long as you have the first couple days planned. Some of the gifts will be simple and others will be a little bigger. The point is to have fun and show him my appreciation and love for one whole month, a little each day.

I hope you have as much fun creating your advent calendar as I did with mine!