Site icon Teadoddles

DIY Tree Advent Calendar Made with Recycled Materials

Today’s DIY came about when I was helping my son clean up his room before he left for college.  For some reason he still had the box his desk came in leaning against a wall.  {I can’t imagine where he gets that from!}  There were some long, corner shaped pieces of cardboard in the box & I thought they might be useful, so I kept them.  {Okay, maybe I do know where he gets it from!}  I spotted them in the corner today & one thing lead to another {crafting wise}.  The next thing I know I had an advent calendar shaped like a tree!  Now I’m going to tell you how I did it & what I would do differently the next time.  On to the crafting!

Disclaimer:  This post contains affiliate links which means I may receive a small commission if you buy something through my link or ad.  This does not change your cost it just helps keep this blog running.  Thanks for your support!  See Privacy Policy & Affiliate Deals page for more information.

 

Cardboard Pieces

These cardboard L-shapes were in the box to protect the edges of the desk during shipping.

When I saw them I immediately thought the looked like a tree top.

I had this idea to make a tree with different levels, just as a decorative sign at first.  My cutting mat was perfect for marking and measuring 1″ & 2″ pieces.

I tried several different things for cutting these because they were fairly thick & dense cardboard.  My tin snips won the battle!

After I cut out what I thought was enough, I set about rearranging them in a tree shape of sorts…

That’s not really working for me…maybe more symmetrical…

I like that better & turning a few up at the bottom will give it a more tree like appearance.  That’s when it occurred to me that this would make a great advent calendar for Christmas!  I would definitely need more pieces & something to mount it to.  Good thing I like to keep things – just in case!  ; )



Making an Advent Calendar

I dug around in my little stash of wood bits & bobs & found a piece that was the perfect size.

It came from an old cheap shelf that didn’t want to stay together anymore, so I obliged & took it apart!  This is a laminate covered particle board, but I wanted to practice painting on that kind of surface anyway.  It will help me figure out how to paint my thrifted desk!

I sanded the surface with a fine grit sandpaper & gave it a coat of chalk paint in red.  The {faux} wood grain shows through, but I like the look!

Originally I was going to leave the cardboard pieces plain, but that’s just not my style!  I grabbed some Christmas-y paper from my scrapbook stash, permanent adhesive, & some gold metallic lustre.

I marked out the paper strip size by tracing around one side of the “L” & then rocking it over to trace the other side.  Everything is held in place with the permanent adhesive & the front edge is gilded in gold.

At this point I decided I didn’t like seeing the white undersides of the peaks, so I decided to paint them dark green.  This lead to a few messes & I really should have done this first!

Since this will be an advent calendar, it needs some numbers.  I didn’t have enough of one kind, so I decided to combine two different ones.  I also had to use some of the spaces leftover from the punch-outs to have enough numbers.

Time to glue things down using my favorite adhesive – e6000.  I also added some gold metallic lustre to the edges of the board, as well as brown wax.

Once I glued down a row of peaks, I glued down the numbers under the peaks.  This kept me from reaching inside the little boxes to do this!

This process took a little time & when I got to the end I had an empty box!  That didn’t seem right & when I looked back at my numbers I realized why.  I left out the 18th!  Boo!  Luckily the glue wasn’t dry & I was able to rearrange things.



All Finished

Well, here’s the finished advent calendar…

It turned out okay, but there’s definitely room for improvement…

The boxes are dark & it’s hard to see some of the numbers.  It would be better if I’d used 1 1/2″ instead of 2″ for the longer pieces.

I do like the way it looks from the side – like a little village!

I would also paint the interior before adding the paper – less mess!  There are 3 more “L” shapes left & I have enough materials to make 3 more of these.  Maybe I’ll sell them, what do y’all think?  : D

Hope y’all are having a wonderful Wednesday!

Pin it for later!

 

 

Exit mobile version