Our "It's the Thought That Counts" Advent Calendar

Today I would like to share with you an important lesson learned. Sometimes Pinterest lies. What am I talking about? I saw an adorable Advent calendar on Pinterest made out of twine, socks, and clothespins and thought, "I can do that!". I rounded up the materials, worked on it for a couple of evenings, and voila - here's the result. It started out above the fireplace. But, no. Just no.

WHOMP WHOMP

In retrospect, I think it would look (somewhat) better if I had done something more monochromatic, but darnit, that wasn't what was in the picture!

So if you come over to my house and wonder why I'm drying socks in the playroom, that's the sorry back story.

Next year I'll be making something else.

That's the unfortunate part of this post. The cheery part of this post is this list of the toddler-friendly activities I'm stuffing in those socks. Here they are, in no particular order:

1. Christmas Dinner at Nana's and Granny's
2. Make a gift for Daddy
3. Watch Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
4. Make a hand print ornament
5. Color a Christmas picture
6. Make a craft
7. Watch the Charlie Brown Christmas special
8. Write a letter to Santa (obviously with a lot of help)
9. Make Christmas-colored play-doh
10. Attend a local high school's Christmas choral concert
11. Attend a local high school's Christmas band concert
12. Learn "Let It Snow!"
13. Drive around to see the lights
14. Drink eggnog
15. Watch How the Grinch Stole Christmas
16. Finger paint with Christmas colors
17. Drink hot chocolate
18. Make grandparent gifts
19. Learn "Jingle Bells"
20. See Santa
21. Go to a Christmas parade
22. Make Christmas cookies
23. Put up our Christmas tree
24. Visit elderly relatives