24 Days before Christmas

. . . well, actually, its more like 13 or 14 days before Christmas. . .

I put up our advent calendar last night . . . er, this morning, at 2 am. . .

This is my very cheap spin on the advent calendar on Infarrantly Creative.  I went to Dollar Tree to buy the cute little buckets and realized I was going to spend about $10, which I don't mind, but these little white bags in packs of 12/$1 caught my eye.

Then, since I don't own one of those cool cricut machines, I sent a humble request to my friend Pam for numbers 1-24 in green and orange.  She was kind and made them for me. (Thanks, Pam! )

I (shhhhh) hot glued the green ribbon to my chalkboard wall.  I think when I take it down, there will be some sadness, i.e. chipped paint, but no worries, I have tons of chalkboard paint.  I pinned the bags up with green paper clips.

They are filled with little tags that say things like:

Make Peppermint Bark


Read Luke 1


Sing Away in the Manger


Play "hide the Christmas candy kiss"


Put a string of white lights up somewhere


Read a Christmas story


Put together Christmas puzzles


Look at Christmas lights with hot cocoa in Daddy's truck

Go to Fareway and pick out Brach's candy mix

and so on . . .and on. . . 

I'll be honest, I don't have them all filled.  I can think of what to put in there as we go along.  It's the right of the mommy in her mommy kingdom.

And I've always wanted to try this idea. . .

. . .sorting clothing into outfits for each day of the week.  I don't know if it will work, but at least it looks really cute!

I am such a conundrum of beautiful design and absolute chaos. 

Really?  Advent Calendar on the 11th of December at 2 am?

Please, tell me I'm not alone.