‘How many days ’til Christmas?’ is a question I am asked by the twins about a million times a day at the moment. I downloaded a Christmas countdown app, but then an idea for a quick and easy DIY flip Christmas countdown popped into my head so I put one together the other afternoon. Now we have a flip countdown of sleeps until Christmas, hanging up for the twins to see and change themselves each day.
It’s so simple to make and I mostly used materials I already had at home – the only thing I had to buy were the hinged binder rings. Here are the instructions…
How to make the flip Christmas countdown
1. Paint numbers onto round stickers (mine were glittery ones that came in a gift wrap set from M&S) using black ink.
2. I made two sets of the numbers 0-9, even though I won’t need all of them. We can use the same thing to countdown to other exciting events!
3. Cut 20 rectangles out of card – mine were 5cm x 7cm. I used a guillotine but you could do this by hand with scissors.
4. Stick a strip of contrasting paper down the vertical centre of each piece of card. I used the marble sticky back plastic I’ve also used in this year’s advent calendar.
5. Punch a hole in the top centre of each of the cards.
6. Stick a number on the middle of each of the cards.
7. Stack up a pile of the ten numbers arranged in order (I went for 9-0 to countdown easily) and group together using the hinged binder ring. Repeat with the other set of numbers.
8. Cut a piece of stick (or dowel) to size, loop through both sets of numbers and tie on a string loop for hanging.
I’ve hung my flip Christmas countdown to a hook, and then decorated the hook with ivy from the garden and a sparkly ribbon bow. The twins take turns to flip over the number each morning (they remember that one does it on even days, and one on odds) and it’s perfect to help them see how many sleeps are still to go.
28 sleeps today people, and those will go in a flash. I can’t wait to share loads more of my Christmas crafts and styling ideas over the next few weeks, including the next instalment of my much-loved brown paper and black Sharpie gift wrap ideas – make sure you follow me on social media and Bloglovin’ or Networked Blogs if you want to make sure you don’t miss a post!
This is such a sweet idea! Hope you don’t mind if I use it as part of my ‘things to do in December’ post I have coming up in the next few days? I’d like link to you and use an image? It’s super pretty & not hard to do – my favourite kind of craft!