origami advent calendar

With December 1st coming up I thought I should re-post the advent post I did for Whatever Dee Dee wants last year.  I edited it a bit so if you want to see the one I did for Dee Dee go here.

With the economy the way it is these days, I am very thankful for affordable paper crafts. I don’t want to spend my money on crafts when I need to be saving it for the holidays. With that in mind I decided to make an advent calendar from paper grocery bags. This is nice because not only is it recycled and therefore great for the environment, but it is also free. :)

Last year each box held a bit of candy, creating a yummy way to countdown to Christmas, but this year I think I'll add some scriptures to read, and activities, or acts of service to do as a family.

To make this you need:

1. 5 paper grocery bags
2. number stamps
3. white craft paint

Here are the steps:

1. Cut 50 squares (6in x 6in) out of the 5 paper grocery bags
2. Fold 25 lids and 25 bottoms. (Here is a video I made teaching how to fold larger boxes using wallpaper, the tiny boxes in this advent arefolded the exact same way but with 6in x 6in paper.)
3. Stamp, stencil or hand paint the numbers
4. Fill with candy , scriptures, or activities and acts of service to do as a family.

I displayed my advent in a nook that has 5 little shelves, how convenient, but you can display these any way you like. You could line them up on you mantle, stack them up like a pyramid, or even hot glue them to poster board and hang them up on the wall. Happy crafting!