Amelia's advent calendar!!

This term the school gave us the project of making an advent calendar with our children!!! I really struggled for ideas at first, worrying about making it "user friendly" for both Amelia to help make and also to use on the run up to Christmas. Her fine motor skills are delayed and her concentration is fairly low for a child of 6.

Eventually I decided to make up a Christmas tree that each day Amelia could decorate with a "bauble!" Once I actually got going I thoroughly enjoyed the task that I thought was going to be quite daunting! In fact I was dissapointed that I hadn't had time to start it earlier with her so that we could have shared more time in making it up.

I was amazed by her once again, she chose what coloured baubles she wanted, she helped cut some on my sizzix machine, she embossed some using my beloved Cuttlebug folders (you should have seen her turning the handle!!LOL I had better keep my eyes on my crafty stash!!) I helped her rub her little finger in my metallic rub-ons and she highlighted some of the textured baubles. I was in charge of the PVA but Amelia took great care in sticking some of the larger die cuts onto their baubles.

Then it can the time to decorate the tree with glitter glue tinsel. I made a big mistake here as she just didn't have the fine motor strength and control to squeeze the tube and "write" at the same time- so it was very much a joint effort working hand over hand...BUT she was an absolute pleasure to work with. Next time I will just let her loose with some metallic markers!!

Late last night I made up all the numbering, triplicating each number on the bauble, the tree base and it's final tree position. I made up a large number row too and popped a peg on to show what day we are on....and presented the finished result to Amelia this morning by showing her how to move the peg onto the number of the date, then look for the same number on the tree base and move it to the tree. I seperated the numbers into 3 sections on the base to make this easier for her.

We lovingly took it into school this morning and my goodness, how proud was I when I saw her showing her support worker and the other children how to move the peg and look for the "same!" What was I worried about!!!! One very proud Mummy!!!

Took some piccies but sorry, they really aren't up to scratch but at gone midnight, what should I expect!!