Oh Camel, Where Art Thou?

I was asked recently if I am a crafty person. As in a glue-gun toting, card-carrying, Michael's coupon using crafter. The answer is no. I can't draw a straight line and I am pretty sure that the sewing machine that I asked for 2 years ago has never been touched. Don't even ask about my failed attempts at knitting (I can make a mean potholder or scarf). But, I have been known to wield a paint pen from time to time. I think I tend to like crafty things that are more about assembling things than actually making things. So this Advent calendar is a perfect project for me.

Start with burlap, the messiest fabric on earth (you will look like you just wrestled three long-haired Persian cats). Draw 25 boxes in whatever order/size you want. There are actual instructions for this, but I am told they are copyrighted, but this isn't rocket science (I think). Draw a stable, or something resembling a rudimentary house.


Hot glue a wooden dowel rod, slightly bigger than your fabric to the rod. (The real instructions say that you are supposed to make a pocket for the dowel rod to slip through, but who needs the real instructions?). Proceed to accidentally burn off a few of your fingerprints with said hot glue in a concerted effort to run from the law.


Arrange some plastic farm animals, a manger, Mary, Joseph, a couple shepherds, some wise men, angels, gold, frankincense and myrhh (or random plastic beads, because what the heck is myrhh, anyway?) onto your squares. Throw in a gold star for good measure. And oh yeah, baby Jesus. These are all attached with some more hot glue and Velcro for when you want to move them to the stable. There is twine attached to the burlap to use for hanging this on the wall.

This is what it is supposed to sort of look like (an example brought in for us to see). Only problem I have found besides the whole hot glue issue is finding plastic camels. Do you have any idea how hard it is to find a plastic camel in this city? The other thing that I was cracking up over was that the only animals left over in making of this were about 8 pigs. Apparently, they weren't kosher or something. Poor piggies.

I will post my finished calendar as soon as I find myself some camels. For stability and to keep the burlap from unraveling, I glued my whole calendar onto a piece of foam board. I will probably finish the edges with some bias tape or ribbon if I am feeling really ambitious. I can't believe December is only 1 week away! I'd better hustle with these camels...