Advent Challenge - Day 1

Every year when I was little we would get out our Advent Calenders on the 1st December.  We had one each my brother and me, old faithfuls that we used year after year.  The first year we got them Dad told us to carefully open the little doors and not to pull them off.

At the end of the Christmas holiday when the decorations came down Dad would sit and carefully close up all the little doors again and lay the calenders flat in the bottom of the decorations box and up they would go into the loft ready for next year.  The following year after 12 months of having the weight of everything else on top of them the little doors were once again firmly closed.

We didn't mind not having new ones, I think deep down we knew that the saving on buying us a new one each year meant an extra little novelty in our Christmas stocking on Christmas morning.

The sort of advent calender with little chocolates behind each door came out a little bit too late for us, so our fun was all about trying to remember which little Christmas image was behind each door, and then oohing in wonderment when we finally got to the big double doors twenty four days later, at the lovely scene of Joseph, Mary, baby Jesus and the donkeys in the stable. 

There are so many lovely Advent Calenders available to buy, all these pictures are taken from Google Images to give you an idea of what I am talking about.  There are some lovely ones that come pre-filled with sweets or gifts for you or your children to open each day in the run up to Christmas.

There are others with little drawers, sacks or compartments for you to fill yourself with mini gifts and chocolates or sweets.  Racking your brain for weeks prior to the first day of December for what to hide behind each number.

I know my boys would have loved this one ... I think I would have too.

But for me, now, all I want to do this year is give and not 'get', so I am joining in with lots of other people and having an Advent Challenge.  Instead of getting a present or opening a little door I will be giving something away each day for the whole of  Advent.  These will be good items and will be going to various charity shops, dropped off in small clusters each time I pass by one.

Along side other items sorted out in the coming weeks I hope this will take me to my 365 items needed to finish off my Decluttering 365 Challenge for this year.

To find out more about this Challenge you can visit Kate Groves' blog post at Streetbank News.  I will try and photograph the item that is leaving the house each day this month and put it on that days blog post just to keep myself on track.

This is today's.

A little colander that is terribly pretty and does work well for all it's lack of holes in the side, but that is surplus to requirements if I'm honest.  I am being ruthless through my cupboards and jettisoning anything that is duplicated in any way.

Sue xx