Advent adventure: 6th December

Today we opened the sixth drawer of our tabletop Advent tree. Inside, my children found a tiny trinket to hang on one of its branches and a strip of paper upon which was written a fun and festive activity. There's one of these for every day of Advent - I know that for sure because I came up with the twenty-four ideas, lovingly wrote them out and carefully placed one in each of the tree's diminutive drawers. Here's a photograph representing today's little Advent adventure.

Visit the rooms - all decked out for Christmas - at the Geffrye Museum of the Home

Advent adventure: 5th December

Today we opened the fifth drawer of our tabletop Advent tree. Inside, my children found a tiny trinket to hang on one of its branches and a strip of paper upon which was written a fun and festive activity. There's one of these for every day of Advent - I know that for sure because I came up with the twenty-four ideas, lovingly wrote them out and carefully placed one in each of the tree's diminutive drawers. Here's a photograph representing today's little Advent adventure.

Act out the story of THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS

Advent adventure: 4th December

Today we opened the fourth drawer of our tabletop Advent tree. Inside, my children found a tiny trinket to hang on one of its branches and a strip of paper upon which was written a fun and festive activity. There's one of these for every day of Advent - I know that for sure because I came up with the twenty-four ideas, lovingly wrote them out and carefully placed one in each of the tree's diminutive drawers. Here's a photograph representing today's little Advent adventure.

Gather all the Christmas books from around the house and share some festive stories with Nan and Grandad

Advent adventure: 3rd December

Today we opened the third drawer of our tabletop Advent tree. Inside, my children found a tiny trinket to hang on one of its branches and a strip of paper upon which was written a fun and festive activity. There's one of these for every day of Advent - I know that for sure because I came up with the twenty-four ideas, lovingly wrote them out and carefully placed one in each of the tree's diminutive drawers. Here's a photograph representing today's little Advent adventure.

Make new words from the letters of the phrase WE WISH YOU A MERRY CHRISTMAS. Find more than twenty to win a prize

Advent adventure: 2nd December

Today we opened the second drawer of our tabletop Advent tree. Inside, my children found a tiny trinket to hang on one of its branches and a strip of paper upon which was written a fun and festive activity. There's one of these for every day of Advent - I know that for sure because I came up with the twenty-four ideas, lovingly wrote them out and carefully placed one in each of the tree's diminutive drawers. Here's a photograph representing today's little Advent adventure.

Make and play with a fresh batch of winter-spice play dough

Advent adventure: 1st December

Today we opened the first drawer of our tabletop Advent tree. Inside, my children found a tiny trinket to hang on one of its branches and a strip of paper upon which was written a fun and festive activity. There's one of these for every day of Advent - I know that for sure because I came up with the twenty-four ideas, lovingly wrote them out and carefully placed one in each of the tree's diminutive drawers. Here's a photograph representing today's little Advent adventure.

Make your own Advent calendar

'Get Stuffed' - making Victorian versions of ourselves

We're a family that love a good outing, especially if it's something active and outdoors, it's culturally stimulating or it's got something to do with food. We love it even more if it's free, so when we heard that the Museum of London were running a Sunday session called Get Stuffed where families could dress up as Victorians and transform themselves into stuffed dolls - totes gratis - we were just about the first in the queue.

The session lasted an hour, in which time the museum's lovely Rosie Fuller gave us a little history lesson about Victorian photography and a few tips on how to pose in a manner appropriate for the era. After a brief explanation about how to use a couple of editing Apps on the museum iPads - we were off; let loose on a heap of replica Victorian costume; posing, photographing and printing images of our Victorian selves onto fabric with aplomb.

Unfortunately, we couldn't actually do the 'getting stuffed' part of the activity within the time - but we were each given a little bag with a kit containing some padding, backing fabric, pins and a little length of cotton to complete the job at home. Straight after the session, we visited the Victorian Walk and sang, still feeling a little Cockney in character, Down at the Old Bull and Bush whilst in the reconstructed public house.

We had great fun back at home trimming, pinning and using Grandma's sewing machine to make our little dolls. To make them even more special, and to go with the whole Victorian theme, we added some dried lavender in with the stuffing. 

Now we have four little Victorian-style, sweet-smelling, dolls; firm favourites with the children. They're so proud to have made them themselves - and I love that we had all this fun for free thanks to Rosie and the Museum of London. When's the next Sunday session then? We're keen, very keen.