Someone cue up "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year." I do not mean football season, although I also enjoy that. I meant Advent Calendar season, the blessed few weeks I spend trawling the internet to find intriguing and fun advent calendars to add to your upcoming holiday cheer. I know Christmas feels a bit of a ways off, but December 1 will be here soon enough, and surely you or someone you know might get a little joy by opening a tiny window to reveal a small treat.
We've obviously got the classics here, like the iconic Bonne Maman jam advent calendar, which I think I joke every year could be called the jamvent calendar. (That joke doesn't quite land but you know. We do our best.) There's Total Wine's wine advent calendar, which I really want and which maybe this year I'll get to before it sells out. If you'd rather get beer than wine, you can do that too.
There's the beauty advent calendar that started it all, the Liberty London one (which I've given as a gift to my early December birthday baby sister and which is AMAZING). I have the Korres beauty one this year and I can't WAIT to crack it open. (I know a lot of bloggers open their advent calendars early to be able to write about them but I want to have the fun of opening it each day; I trust that Korres would never go all Skims on us.)
Sephora's advent calendar also looks great, although I think it's sold out online and you need to pick it up in the store. And I love the selection in the Kiehl's one. Likewise, the Elemis one looks amazing – it's almost $1000 worth of product in there. (I just really love tiny beauty products.)
Maybe you don't want beauty products. Maybe you want A PICKLE ADVENT CALENDAR. That one is only 12 days worth, so you can use it for the 12 Days of Christmas, if you'd rather. The mega-popular Fly By Jing chili crisp/spice blend calendar is also a 12-dayer (and looks very enticing). This Walkers Shortbread calendar is a classic! And I can't imagine anyone would be unhappy with 24 days of See's Candies. (That one has a bad review rating and I went to read them, and it's all people mad that the system prompted them to leave a review before the calendar shipped. Calm down, y'all. Soon you can have a piece of candy!!!)
If we're really going to be luxe, how about the Harrods Food Hall advent calendar? It's got Boxing Day Chutney! I'm also so tempted by the (less luxe) Universal Yums Smorgasbord from Sweden! (World Market is a great source for advent calendars in general.) Or what about an advent calendar that's all Unexpected Licorice? Our friends at Nuts.com have one called 'Twas The Nut Before Christmas and they deserve props just for the name. How about 12 DAYS OF CHEESE? Yes, please.
There are also a lot of non-food/non-beauty options. Your local museum will probably have something great. This one from the Met seems so cool – it's a puzzle AND it's magnets! Uncommon Goods is offering an embroidery advent calendar, where you end up with a piece of completed work at the end. They've also got a MYSTERY advent calendar – where you're solving a mystery, not where the contents of said calendar are a mystery – and one where you get a daily little science experiment! This Nutcracker-themed one is SO sweet for kids, and speaking of kids, even Play-Doh has a 12-day advent calendar.
Finally, I leave you with this one from the New York Public Library, which contains 24 TINY BOOKS that are also ornaments?!?!? Delightful!
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