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12/11/2013

Paper bag advent calendar



Christmas!  I love it. 
The family aspect is the best part, 
I just love doing Christmas stuff with my favorite people.


Last year Nik was still little so we started him off with the old standby advent calendar, paper type with flapped windows. 

With candy inside of course. 
This year I wanted to try something different.  
And cheap


Materials:
Jute
Brown paper sandwich bags
Colored paper (only one sheet needed)
Candy and/or presents
Glue (not pictured)

Tools:

Hole punch
Scissors
A circle item to trace
Printer (not pictured)





I used Jute to attach the bags to my fireplace, 
but you can really use any material you want to hang this. 
Ribbon, yarn, rope, fishing line.. 
You could even go completely off the rails and use clothes pins to hold the bags to the line instead of looping the rope through holes.


I used word to create one sheet that contained the numbers 10-24. 
I obtained a small circle from Niks play dough set, and traced circles around the numbers.  I cut them out and glued them to a piece of green velum I had. 



No, I do not have a circle punch in my supplies and that is why it appears like a drunk monkey was allowed to assist on this project with the cutting part. 



I folded each bag about 100 times to find just the right length when folded
 and cut the rest off. 
This part is not necessary to the ascetics of the bag, however..
I decided the best way to open the bags would be to lovingly rip the bags off of the jute, and a thinner fold is better for lovingly ripping.



I helped Pickles put a cute little reindeer on the Christmas Eve bag so he would know it was special.




I lined up the bags and filled them with the M&M's and gold coins. 
In the 23rd and 24th bag I put a special M&M ornament and a Santa.


Q: What do you call Santa's helpers? 

A: Subordinate clauses 

That joke has nothing to do with this project, but that one is just funny. 

I folded the tops of the bags down twice and punched two holes in the fold. 
I slipped the Jute through the holes. 


I threaded the jute through all the bags, 
and pushed the bags down the jute.
 Ensuring they were in the proper order and numerical. 



Just a tip. 
Be careful when pulling the jute through the bag holes as they are easily ripped. 
I'm glad the package of brown bags came with more than what I needed. 
I was a bit overzealous a few times and needed replacements. 




We have already opened two bags at this point. 
Nik opens a bag, says "pur-rize!" and immediately dives for the candy.
Pickles and I are both dying to open that reindeer bag, I can't wait!

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