***EDITED!!! Sorry,not sure where the photos vanished to!!!!***
I saw the most wonderful craft activity for making your own Advent calendar of sorts on Instagram from a maker called Amber Lu who posts at @tulips_and_a_toolbox . It involved constructing your own cardboard forest of Christmas trees with a wooden base. I was itching to give it a go and decided to adapt it so you don't have to use wood IF, like me, you are not handy with a saw and wood or don't have the money to spend on a piece of wood. I really recommend the maker as there are loads of eco-crafts on there!
I wrote my own instructions for my neighbour to follow with their kids as I adapted the idea slightly to give measurements etc, but remember, this is not my idea and I was able to follow her post with very limited instructions from the very clear pictures she shared! My instructions are probably very over complicated but I thought it might be a good reading and doing activity for the kids at school!
Materials:
- Cardboard box
- 24 cocktail sticks (possibly only 21 as you are cutting some in half)
- Black thin felt tip pen
- Glue (I used PVA)
- Brown Paper tape (or decorative tape)
Making your trees
1. Cut a rectangle- one side from a cardboard box. Be sure to remove all labels and avoid printed parts.
You can adjust the dimensions to make it smaller and larger as you see fit or to match your box size but I found a rectangle with a width of 14/13 cm was good.
2. Measure 6cm along the length (long edge) and mark it with a pencil line.
3. Now draw a line to the other side of the box. You have a rectangle that is 14cm x 6cm.
4. Half way along your 6cm width, mark a pencil mark at 3cm.
5. Draw diagonal lines connecting both corners of the other end of the rectangle with that pencil mark. You should now have an isosceles triangle.
5. The same end where you drew your 3cm pencil mark, mark 3cm along that edge of the rectangle you have drawn.
6. Connect that mark with a diagonal to the bottom corner of your rectangle at the other end. You now have 2 identical isosceles triangles that share a diagonal edge.
7. Continue to make more rectangles in the same way until you have 6/7 of them.
8. Repeat these previous steps but this time using a rectangle strip that has a 10cm width. Your triangles can also be 5cm instead of 6cm long in total (mark2.5cm along for the half way) . Make 6/7 of them.
9. Repeat these steps but this time with a rectangle with a width of 8cm.
10. Repeat these steps but this time with a rectangle with a width of 6/5cm.
11. Cut out your triangles. Discard the very end pieces that are not isosceles triangles.
12. You should now end up with 24/28 triangles of 4 sizes. (I made extra just in case)
13. Take a triangle and using a black felt tip or fineliner and draw a straight border around the edge of each triangle around 4-5mm from the edge. Do the same with all your triangles.
14. Now decorate the inside simply with dotted lines, lines, circles, line, dots, in various repeated patterns. Try to achieve as much variety as possible but keep as neat as possible.
15. You might notice I did make a couple of Christmas tree shapes rather than simple triangles. Do if you feel you can make symmetrically and cut easily. (harder with small kids)
Making your base stand
16. Cut 2 rectangles 30cm long by 15cm wide. (Feel free to make your measurements longer than mine. I probably could have been a little more generous with mine although I do like the crowded nature of my forest. E.g. make it 40cm long and 15cm wide.)
16. Glue them on top of each other to make a double thickness base and then use either brown paper tape or decorative tape to make a border around the edge that covers up the rough edge of the cut cardboard and goes just over the top and bottom layer.
17. Start with your tallest trees. Lay your trees out in a row along the length to check that they will fit along the length of the board when standing side by side without overlapping. Check you are happy with the arrangement. Keep them in this row whilst doing the same with all the other sizes.
18. Now, on the back of each tree, number them from 1-24 in pencil for the moment.
19. Draw 4 light pencil lines that are equidistant along the length.
20. Lay out your flat trees in order along your first row and mark a darker pencil dot where the middle of each triangle base is. Make sure they don't overlap. Do the same for the trees in the other rows.
21. Use a large safety pin to make a hole where all your marked dots are. Wiggle the pin around to make sure it makes the hole a bit bigger (Big enough for a cocktail stick to go through happily but not fall over).Make sure you go through both layers of cardboard. I used a double piece of funky foam to ensure I didn't make a hole in my table!
22. Mark on the numbers by each hole. I use a black fine-liner and made my numbers like calligraphy. I marked mine from front to back but in retrospect,when I started putting the trees, I think it would be nicer to start with the back row as the first numbers so you get to see all the trees face on completely before the next row goes in front.
24. Number your trees in black pen right at the top of each tree tip in nice letting (not too big!)
Adding cocktail sticks to trees*( you could do this after you make the trees but I waited to check my measurements)
25. Now use paper tape to tape cocktail sticks to the back of each tree. Start with the back row trees Check you are happy with the height of them. They need to be the tallest so they have the most stick showing at the bottom. Make the next row of trees a bit 'shorter' by how you position the stick.
26. For your front row, cut your cocktail sticks in half and keep only a little of the cocktail stick showing at the bottom.
27. Check that all your trees will go happily into their holes.
28.Now gather up your trees into a small basket, bag or tray and lay them nicely beside your base.
29. Each day of Advent, add a tree to your forest. Feel free to sing Christmas tree themed songs or carols! You could even write one in tiny letters on the back of each tree to sing. By the 24th December, you will have a forest.
30.As an optional extra,you could cut out a golden shiny star on taller skewer and make a hole for it above your Christmas tree height as an extra for Christmas day!
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I was so pleased with my Advent calendar and cannot wait to use it in December.
The thing I liked most about this was that there is no plastic and the majority of the craft is reused cardboard box. 9 of my cocktail sticks were from eating olives in a restaurant (I made CBC and I only use ONE and kept the rest for this craft!).
It would be nice to make a little drawstring fabric bag to keep this all in for next Christmas. Haven't quite thought that one through yet!
