Using The 2023 Advent Calendar Cards To Create A Circle Shaker Advent Calendar

This year I've got a couple fun projects I'm playing around with in addition to documenting my December using our December Daily® collection. 

The first is one came about while I was doing a video prior to the launch talking about the 2023 Sticker Advent Calendar. This year's Advent Calendar includes 4x6 number cards - these are packaged in front of the fun seasonal stickers + sticker embellishments that you can open all at once or one day at a time for your own Advent Calendar. I love that this is a product that has multi-uses: not only can you use the stickers to support your December storytelling, you can also do something with those 4x6 number cards. 

You could easily punch holes in the number cards to create a 4x6 December Daily® album and pair the number cards with photos and words. You could use the number cards here and there in your album to support your stories. 

I considered those ideas and then decided to go in a different direction after flipping back through my 2022 December Daily® album and seeing this 1/2 circle shaker page. 

I loved recording a little story about our Sunday morning but I also really loved the 1/2 circle shaker page: the color (red type on white), the messy red stitching, and the sequin mix. 

Seeing that page pushed me over the edge to decide to turn the number cards from the Sticker Advent Calendar into a series of circle shakers with December Daily® pattern papers on the back. My plan is to make all 24 cards into shakers and add one simple December activity to the back. These could be hung on a tree (that would be so fun) or hung together using a dowel to create a mobile of hanging circles. 

I love that this is something I could bring out year after year when I get out my holiday decor. 

I used a 3.5 inch circle punch to punch out each number. To create the shakers I'm using pieces of plastic cut from page protectors from my stash. I'm stitching the messy circles with my sewing machine and adding in the sequin mixes/charms/embellishments before completing the stitched circle. I'm punching circles from past + present December Daily® pattern papers and adhering those to the back. I'm using gold eyelets for the holes to hang the circles. Once I finish all the circles I'll add a simple activity to the back of each circle. 

Here's a video that walks through the process for putting these circle shakers together: 

I'll share once again when I have all the rest of the circles finished and I figure out how I want to display these during the holiday. 

If you have fun ideas for simple activities to add to the back please add them in the comments below! 

SUPPLIES

• 2023 Advent Calendar
• Pattern Papers
• 3.5 Inch Circle Punch
• We R Memory Keepers Hole Punch
• Gold Eyelets
• Crop A Dile
• Brother Sewing Machine
• Sequin Mixes
• Page Protectors (or other plastic) to stitch on top