Oh, the advent calendar!

I loved the book advent idea that I mentioned yesterday. I like the idea of reading a book a day, but wanted to figure out how to count down to Christmas and involve Abby in picking and tracking the books we've read. Then I saw this post by Rowdy Pea. Oh, I loved it. The simplicity, the Asian sort of bent, the not overtly religious or specifically anything about it. And, it's lovely. So, I just straight up copied her. They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. . . right?
My take on it is a little different. I made up tiny cut outs of all of the winter books we have on hand from our collection and from my run to the library. I got the images from Library Thing
and some from ebay. I printed the out and put them in a bowl. Every night before bed, Abby picks a story from her bowl. We read it and sing the song if there is one (Jingle Bells, Rudolph, Frosty the snowman) and then she puts the cut-out in the advent cup for that day.
Of course we'll read her the other stories any time over the next few weeks, but this makes each story have a special spot in our holiday season. On Christmas day, she'll get a new winter book for our collection. She loved it last night. I've been giddy with the fun of it all and am so happy with our new tradition.

The whole thing cost about $6. I got scrap-booking paper that has designs on both sides. Each sheet made 4 cups. I only made 24 cups so I didn't have to buy a whole extra piece of paper for one cup. Also, we won't be here for Christmas Day, so I figured it would be okay. The numbers are just little scrap-booking stickers that I got from our local scrap-booking store. I strung them all on fishing line and used a red ribbon from my stash. And, I did it all in about an hour last night.