100 Fun Advent Calendar Countdown Activity Ideas & FREE Printables

kids advent countdown with holiday activities - Design Dazzle

This is a super easy no-sew Advent countdown calendar created with socks. A printed activity is tucked inside each of the twenty four socks one for each day counting down until Santa visits. The activities listed are for the family to spend time together creating, making, reading, playing and eating! A lot of the activities are probably something your family might do anyway – decorate the Christmas tree, bake cookies, drive around the neighborhood to look at lights etc. This is a fun idea to organize your family plans and events and give kids a countdown until Christmas. I’ve included 100 activities that can be printed out and used for your Advent calendar. Pick and choose 24 activities that will work for your family. Once you’ve completed the activity remove the activity card from the sock. Your kids will quickly see which socks don’t have the activity card in them – thus the countdown.

Advent Countdown Calendar including 100 activities - FREE Printables - Design Dazzle

Socks were purchased at the Dollar Store, Target and Michaels Crafts. This project cost about $25 to make.

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Steps to create the Advent Sock Countdown Calendar:

Supplies:
24 socks
ribbon or 5/8” Twill Tape Ribbon Red
Mini Clothespins 2-1/2″-24/Pkg
24 round wood disks or round hang tags
Sticker numbers (I used craft foam)
24 Blank Tags White

Step 1:
I used my Cricut Cutting Machine to cut out craft foam for numbers. I happened to have the foam on hand and it was the right color. After cutting out numbers 1-24 I glued them to small 1 inch wood disks.

Step 2:
Hot glue the wood disks to the front of the sock. If you are interested in turning over the numbers as you count down days, then don’t use the wood disks. Use round hang tags instead.

Step 3:
I used Command Strip Hooks on my fireplace mantel to hang the Advent countdown. Hang the twill tape where you will be placing the countdown to get a measurement of how long the twill tape needs to be. Mark it and take down. Don’t cut yet!

Step 4:
Lay the twill tape on the floor or counter. Arrange the socks in the order that looks good to you. Clothespin the socks to the twill tape.

Step 5:
Print out the activity lists you’ve chosen. Cut out the activity and paste onto the tags or print the activity list on cardstock and don’t use the tags. Place one tag inside each sock. To resize the list place in a word document and resize.
Remember to check your calendar to fit just the right activities with the right evening. You can always switcheroo the activities at the last minute ; )

Step 6:
Hang up the twill tape and socks over a doorway, fireplace mantel, etc. It helps to have two people for this part. Cut the excess twill tape.

kids advent countdown with holiday activities

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Advent Countdown Calendar including 100 activities/ideas for your family to enjoy! FREE Printables - Design Dazzle

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100 Advent Activities

Decide what activities your family would like to do. The key is figuring out your family schedule in December and doing simple activities that don’t require a lot of time on certain days (i.e. make Hot Chocolate, write a letter to Santa or draw a Christmas picture). Maybe the weekends work best for more time consuming activities i.e. decorating a Gingerbread house, Christmas shopping, going sledding, etc. I’ve included several “read a Christmas story” or “read a Christmas book” because it’s an easy, great Christmas activity. Check out how we do our Christmas books with Christmas book bags. We have several books and so we will include the book reading into our 24 day count down. For example one night we will roast marshmallows and read a Christmas book. Another night we will set up the Nativity and read a Christmas book. These activities don’t take too much time and can be done together.

There are activities for younger kids and older kids. Older kids can help wrap gifts, send out Christmas cards (stuff envelopes, sign names, lick stamps) make it fun! Younger kids would enjoy playing with play dough, eating a North Pole breakfast, etc.

Here is the list of 100 activities. There are a couple of blanks to add your own activities. Once you download the file (see below for details) simply print out the pages you choose.

activity list 13

This is what the files looks like printed on 8.5″ x 11″ paper.

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Printable files are for personal use only. They are not for commercial use.