Brendan & Tiffany Sullivan

I love counting down the days until Christmas. Grandpa Leibbrand always had a calendar and daily gift for us. Sometimes Mom would buy the cardboard advent calendars with doors that would reveal a piece of chocolate for each day. I remember sneaking some of the chocolates early. One year we had little box ornaments that were filled with candy and opened for the countdown. Some of the simplest advent calendars I used were ones I made with paper–often a chain with 24 links and I would tear one off per day.

This year, I wanted to make an advent calendar, but I wanted something a little more sophisticated and something that would last for years to come. With my new hobby of sewing, I thought an advent calendar of fabric would be perfect. I surfed the web and found several ideas and inspiring designs.

This is what I ended up with:

Advent Calendar Wall Hanging

I bought the cute mini ornaments from Jo-Ann Fabrics.

mini ornaments

The ornaments had ugly gold threads. I cut them off and hot glued ribbon loops on the backs of the ornaments.

ribbon loop

glue gun magic

new loops!

ornaments with beige ribbon loops

I think the ornaments look happier!

I wanted to use my Hobby Lobby Christmas music fabric for the background, so I laid out the ornaments and buttons to figure out how large my tree would need to be.

ornaments in tree-shape

close-up of the cuties

Based on the size of the ornaments, I cut a Christmas tree shape out of wrapping paper.

tree pattern next to ornaments

My pattern!

tree pattern

I pinned the pattern to my beautiful Jo-Ann Fabric’s material and cut it out.

pin pattern in place

cut out pattern

Now, I should have sewn the buttons on the tree, but I like to make things difficult and appliquéd the two sides of the tree on the music fabric first. :}

I pinned the tree to the background.

tree pinned to background

detail of pinning

This green fabric was really difficult to work with (I have a knack for choosing tricky material). I had to garment hem the edges and then appliqué the tree. The garment hem kept the fabric’s weave from falling apart with the slightest tug. I ended up going around the edges twice when appliquéing.

two sides are appliquéd

detail of appliqué

After I appliquéd the tree, I positioned the buttons and pinned them in place. I ended up using more than 24 so that I can switch up the placement of the ornaments from year to year.

positioned and pinned buttons

detail of pinned buttons

All of the buttons are sewn and make the tree look festive even if it is void of ornaments.

sewn buttons

Next, I stuffed the Christmas tree to give it some body and added interest.

stuffed and appliqued shut

I needed to “quilt” my stuffed tree so that the stuffing wouldn’t settle at the bottom of the tree. I chose really tiny jingle bells and stitched them in alternating rows.

quilted tree with bells

detail of mini-bell

I liked the bells so much, I had to add them to the tips of each branch. They make the cutest jingle sound!

detail of branch bells

The pockets for the ornaments took quite a bit of time and they are the reason my advent calendar couldn’t start on December 1st this year.

I cut out two sets of of rectangles for either side of the tree (ornament pockets). The dimensions are 13″ X 5″; 10.5″ X 5″; and 8″ X 5″. I garment hemmed them all. The final pocket (#25 for the star) is 9.5″ X 5″.

cut and hemmed rectangles

I then pressed them in half (“hotdog” style). The 25 “trunk” of the tree is a “hamburger” fold.

pressed pockets

I used a disappearing ink fabric marker and wrote each number for the pockets. I then embroidered the numbers with bright red floss.

embroidered pockets

detail of embroidery

The pins indicate the pocket size. They are approximately 2.5″ in length. The pockets are pressed so that the backside of the embroidery is covered by a length of fabric and thus protected from ornaments snagging it.

I then pinned the pockets to the music fabric.

pinned pockets

detail of pinned pockets

Next step, appliqué the pockets. Once the pockets are appliquéd, I straight stitched the pockets.

appliqued and stitched pockets

The ornaments are ready to go!

backside of pockets

After all of the pockets were done, I quilted my advent calendar.

qulit sandwich

My backing is green flannel. After pinning the layers, I quilted around the tree and pockets. I then used red binding and added a “sleeve” so that my advent calendar could hang on a curtain rod. I did not include quilting instructions because I am clearly a novice, and there are many wonderful tutorials currently on the web.

finished product!

Since this project took me so long, it’s already the sixth day of advent.

see the ornament loops?

I can’t wait to pull the star out of this pocket.

pocket #25!!!!

Happy countdown!

Love,

Tiff