Magnetic Chalkboard Advent Calendar

by Anne Davidson

4 Materials

One of my favorite Christmas traditions is the Advent Calendar. Counting down the days until Christmas was magical for me as a child, and I hope to capture some of that nostalgia by starting my own traditions with my daughter this year. To that end I created a magnetic Advent Calendar with mini Christmas Tree Ornaments. The ornaments go to decorate a mini hall tree each night. The calendar also counts down the number of “sleeps” until Christmas, which captures for me some of the childlike glee involved with crossing off the days until Christmas.

magnetic chalkboard advent calendar, chalkboard paint, crafts

Last year I attempted a magnetic Advent Calendar with mixed success. I used a few coats of Rust-oleum Magnetic Primer to make my chalkboard from Painted Fox magnetic. They don't have the exact chalkboard I bought previously. After a number of coats and following the directions on the can (to throughly mix the paint etc.) I was left with a chalkboard that still didn't hold the Christmas swag I wanted to display. Thus I ended up hanging the ornaments on ribbon, which still was rather heavy and precarious.

Then the hubs came up with the idea of stronger magnets. Who-ha-ha! I was imagining magnets with the power of Magneto from X-men! We found these mini neodymium magnets on Amazon. They are quite strong! I used a hot glue gun to attach the magnets to mini clothespins. Some clothespins needed two--especially for that portly Santa ornament!