Advent!

I love advent.  As child, my mother would pretend there was a elf in the house hiding and he would write me little notes each day and once every few days surprise me with a gift.  I'm 24 and my dad still mails me an advent calendar every year (this one he even included one for my boyfriend).

When my sister and I were old, my mom use to do "Dollar Advent" with us and I decided to share the idea with Gregory.  Basically, you divide up the days of advent (we did 9 for each of us and 4 for the beagle), go to the Dollarstore and buy the silly, fun gifts, wrap them up and each day, pick a name to own a present.

We use to put our names into a big, mirrored advent box my mom had but I did not want to buy one.   So, I took 24 matchboxes, decorated them, and a put a name in each.  They are very cute and festive and even Gregory (who does not really like holiday things) likes them.  We started today and Gregory got the first present, tissues with the Peanuts characters on them!