Christmas Countdown

Last year in the mama blogosphere, I came across this idea for creating a calendar of activities for the Countdown to Christmas (in lieu of the traditional "Advent" Calendars). They're all over the internet. In matchbooks. Recycled magazines. Super-fancy sewn and embroidered envelopes. Traditional felt. With a cookie sheet. Ridiculously complicated magnetic tins. And the original place I spotted the idea, in envelopes made of fancy paper. Here's the lovely mama who gave me all those links with her fancy paper envelopes.

So I decided to take a bunch of random spare time I didn't have to make fancy paper envelopes, though not with fancy paper, but rather with magazines. First I made a form with some heavy cardstock from a random brochure in the recycling. I made two identical rectangles from it, and cut one corner to corner to form the properly sized folding sides. I taped those to the edges of the other rectangle and used this as my guide both for cutting and folding. I found pictures that were big enough so there wasn't a collage element to it. It was a handy way to get rid of all the holiday catalogs that have been coming nonstop (even though I swear I took us off those lists).
I folded down all the pointy edges.
Then I wrote out activities (many stolen from others' lists) on bits of paper which I glued inside.
Lastly, I made labels with numbers on them to keep the envelopes sealed.
Now they all await opening. I'm excited for the kids to be excited. I'm awaiting the adventure of it.