Upcycled, Children's Christmas Crafts

Yesterday was supposed to be the November meeting of our homeschool group's Craft Club.  Unfortunately I had to cancel the meeting because B was sick.  But that did not stop us from doing the crafts, ourselves, at home.  We had 2 crafts to do, making gift boxes and pencil cases out of cereal boxes and making an Advent calendar.  Both crafts took a lot of time, but we had nothing but, so we put on the Christmas carols, spread everything out on the family room floor and had a great afternoon together.  B was really upset that I canceled Craft Club.  He didn't think everyone needed to be disappointed just because he couldn't go.  He asked me to leave him home and go do the crafts with the other children without him.  Such a big heart on that boy!

This is the link to the gift boxes we made.  This is the template for the pencil case we made.

I originally planned to make this Countdown to Christmas Calendar with the Craft Club.  But since B was sick, I hadn't been able to get to the craft store to get the necessary supplies.  Then I found this Advent "Calendar" idea using toilet paper rolls and I knew this is what we should make.  October's Craft Club meeting included making these spooky eyes in the bushes and I saved waaaay more toilet paper rolls that I needed to!  So, we made the toilet paper roll Advent calendar yesterday and used up 24 toilet paper rolls.  I still have tons of TP and paper towel rolls left, so I need to keep searching for craft ideas for them...  Inside the TP rolls, I placed a piece of leftover Halloween candy and one of these 24 printable Christmas jokes.  We went through magazines and cut out numbers for the days, 1 - 24, and B still plans do to more decorating on each roll.  He has placed the rolls in our Christmas tree.

I plan to add some other activities to these toilet paper rolls after reading Creekside Learning's great Advent Calendar activity ideas.  Julie at Creekside Learning has inspired me and I will include the following activities: my dad likes to take B to see Santa every year; my mom has B over to bake Christmas cookies (I do make food gifts for people at Christmas, but not cookies), we're going to see a holiday performance at a local high school; I found a gift card worth 2 movie tickets so I'll take B to see Rise of the Guardians one weekday; etc.  As the wise Julie at Creekside Learning does, I'll put those special activities in each day as the month rolls along, just a few days ahead of time, to ensure it fits in with our schedule.