There are so many creative advent calendars around these days – it’s no longer just a chocolate, or a picture behind a door. We really like some of the toy advent calendars that are around like the Playmobil or LEGO ones, but if you wanted to focus on quality time with the kids this advent season then why not try making your own kids Christmas crafts advent calendar?
Using a wooden advent calendar that you can find in craft shops, you can make your own calendar using whatever ideas you like, and change it up each year. How about writing different crafty or fun creative activities on pieces of paper and putting one inside each of the doors, so that the kids can open it up and discover their fun project for the day?
We were sent our calendar thanks to: Action Storage, school lockers supplier.
The first task could be to decorate the calendar itself!
Here are a few more ideas that you could use to fill up your crafty Christmas advent calendar:
- Make Snowflake Handprints
- Try a Christmassy hair style
- Make Paper Plate Snowflakes
- Bake some Christmas Tree Brownies
- Make Salt Dough Christmas Tree Decorations
- Play Pin the Nose on Rudolph
- Make a Personalised Photo Christmas Ornament Craft
- Make a Paper Plate Snowman Scene
- Make Personalised Photo Wreath Cards
- Colour these Snowflake Colouring Pages
- Make these Mix n Match Stone Snowmen
- Colour these Winter Clothing Colouring Pages
- Make a Textured Winter Collage Craft
- Bake Christmas Cookies
- Make this Winter Mittens Craft
- Decorate these Christmas Ornaments Printables
- Make a Mini Christmas Tree
- Make your own DIY Wrapped Chocolate Gifts
- Decorate your Playhouse
- Colour these Christmas Tree Printables
- Make a Stained Glass Wreath Festive Craft
- Make and play with your own Artificial Snow
- Learn about How to say Merry Christmas in different languages
- Make Christmas Ginger Biscuits
- Make and play with Peppermint Play Dough Christmas Trees
- Decorate Coloured Salt Christmas Trees
- Make your own Sponge Painted Christmas Lights Wrapping Paper
- Make and eat Christmas Star Sandwiches
- Make Christmas Ornament Sun Catchers
- Challenge the kids to take some Beautiful Christmas Photographs
- Make Craft Stick Ice Skaters
- Make these Snowman Collage Christmas Cards
You could add a few other fun activities or special days out too, like
- Visit a Santa’s grotto
- Go Ice skating
- See a pantomime or Christmas show
- See Reindeer at your local farm park
- Watch a Christmas movie with hot chocolate and marshmallows
- Shop for gifts and give them to a good cause (a lot of shopping centres have trees where you can take donate gifts to children)
- Go on a walk or drive to see all of the local Christmas lights
- Play Christmas board games
There are more than 24 ideas here, so you can choose whatever suits you the most or swap some out for your own ideas.
I love how open ended these kind of advent calendars are, and you could repurpose it for all kinds of activities and learning games throughout the year too – putting different letters behind each door to help kids learning their alphabet for example.
What type of advent calendar do you use? If you have some more ideas, share them with me in the comments.
Don’t forget to pin the list for later!
Anna Marikar, mum of four and seasoned blogger, has spent over a decade sharing her parenting journey and passion for kid-friendly crafts and free printables.
Her easy-to-follow craft ideas and practical parenting advice have transformed In The Playroom into a cherished resource for parents.
Some great ideas, I’m doing the reverse advent this year and donating a box of food to a local food bank.