I know I've totally ignored this blog but it's time for HANDMADE HOLIDAYS again!

So, I'm trying to figure out what to do for Thanksgiving (there will be 2 this year) and then Christmas - WHOZZA - Advent starts the Sunday after Thanksgiving so this has to be a priority. Okay, Advent, Advent - what do you do crafty during Advent? Jesse Tree, Advent Calendar (this is such a misnomer - it's just a countdown during December, not the whole of Advent but since Advent isn't a standard number of days, there has to be some concessions made to make it reusable), Handcrafted Christmas...

I found a really fun advent calendar idea here, here, here and here - okay, those that clicked thru, the first 3 are the really similar and that last one was a blatant promo - seems I'm late to the party on this super simple, family-centered, activity-based advent calendar! Here's the deal - you come up with 24 things that you normally do during the Christmas Season, write them down and put them in your advent calendar (the calendar can be as simple as a candy dish with pieces of paper folded up and numbered, handmade with felt and glue or a fancy store-bought drawer set), then, ba-da-bing ba-da-boom, you have a fun advent calendar AND a holiday checklist! So for the hard part - coming up with 24 things that you do (or want to do) with your family during the Christmas Season! Yikes! the obvious - Head to Snickers Gap to get a tree (okay, to get a tree for my sister since I have no room for a real tree and have the best Charlie Brown artificial tree around and it's prelit! but going to a tree farm is a tradition and we always have fun!), Deck the Halls, Make cookies, Take family photo for Christmas card, Do the Wolf Trap Holiday Sing-A-Long (note to self: when numbering the to-do list, somethings are on their own schedule and need to be numbered accordingly - this is for Dec 4). Okay, 5 down, 19 more to go... gotta go back and read those blogs for some more ideas... I still don't think that my kids would go without the daily candy so this one looks fun too:



or I could go hybrid like this one



nah - it will either be glittery like the tins or fabric so it can be store easily - decisions, decisions... if I were betting on this, I'd go with fabric!