How to Make a Religious Advent Calendar
An advent calendar is a traditional December calendar-chart that helps kids count down the days until Christmas. It features little pockets for each day of the month that hold treats or prizes that can only be consumed/used on their own particular day. While advent calendars are sometimes Santa themed, they can also be made religiously themed by using nativity scene inspired decorations. Making your own religious advent calendar is fun and easy.
Things You'll Need
- 25 pieces of candy
- Colored tape in red or green
- Construction paper
- Scissors
- Glue stick
- Puffy paints
- Wooden dowel
- Yarn
Instructions
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1
Cut a long strip of colored tape in either red or green to measure 4.5 feet long. Turn the tape sticky side up and press 25 pieces of candy into the tape, with one after the other and each piece of candy about 1 inch apart.
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2
Use scissors to cut multiple strips of construction paper in the color of your choice that are as long as the length of the paper and 3 inches wide. Use a glue stick to secure the strips of construction paper together until you have one huge strip that measures to be 6 feet by 3 inches.
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3
Press the long strip of construction paper over the sticky side of the colored tape, using your fingers to push down the areas in between pieces of candy to secure them to the strip. Snip off any excess paper that remains on either end.
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4
Cut out 25 different religious shapes from various pieces of construction paper, such as stars, mangers, crosses, gifts from the three wisemen, a shepard's cane, various farm animals, and a baby Jesus. The shapes should be about 1.5 inches by 1.5 inches. You can use markers to add extra details to the construction paper cut outs.
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5
Use the glue stick to secure each construction paper shape over the other side of the strip, with each shape over the back of a piece of candy.
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6
Write out the numbers 1-25 using puffy paints over the cut out shapes, with the number 25 being the first number and 1 being the last. Allow the paint to dry.
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7
Glue some decorative craft rickrack along each edge of the advent calendar, surrounding the cut out shapes. Allow the glue to dry and use some more colored tape to secure a wooden dowel that's about the size of a pencil to the top back of the advent calendar, right above the first piece of candy. Tie a string of yarn to each end of the dowel so that you can hang the calendar up on the wall.
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8
Remove each piece of candy and corresponding date number as each date comes, tearing it off from the rest of the calendar each day until it is Christmas.
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References
Resources
- Photo Credit Advent image by Carina Lorenz from Fotolia.com
