Upcycled K-Cup Advent Calendar

I have been trying to reuse my K-Cups in as many ways as I can. I feel like they just have more to give after a delicious cup of coffee. First to keep them out of the trash pile at least for awhile longer and then to save money. I really love to save money on craft supplies, especially since I use them so often. I have a large scrapbook supply hoard, so I already had ton of materials on hand to choose from. If you don't you can pick up a few pretty scrapbook paper sheets at your local craft store. Empty, clean K-Cups make the perfect holders for small items and so I thought they would work well as an advent calender and I really love how it turned out. When you have emptied the grounds out of your K-Cups be sure and empty them into your compost pile and stretch it even further.

Upcycled K-Cup Advent Calendar

Supplies Needed:

11″x 17″ frame
24 clean, empty k cups
Scrapbook paper/cardstock
Number stickers
Small individually wrapped candy
Scissors
Hot glue gun/glue

Directions:

Remove glass or plastic from frame, discard or set aside for another project.

Cut coordinating scrapbook paper and piece it together to fill the 11″ x17″ frame. Glue it down to the backing that is inside the frame.

Use one of your clean, empty K-Cups to trace and cut out 24 circles. You can use all the same paper if you wish or a hodgepodge of coordinating papers. Trace the top, the wider opening of cup.

Fill each cup with one piece of individually wrapped candy, or you can put in a small note, tiny trinket or toy. Run a thin bead of hot glue all around the rim and quickly press a circle onto it. You want to use just enough glue to keep candy in and cover on but not so much that the cover wont rip off.

Next lay your frame flat. Arrange cups on frame until they look good. If you so desire, measure to line them up exactly; I just eyeballed it. Then pick them up one at at time and add a very generous blob of hot glue before pressing it back into place.

You can use all the same number stickers on your cups, but that is probably going to require that you buy 10 packs of the same sticker. That ruins the thrifty part of this project, so I recommend one of two things: you can write the numbers on with a sharpie or paint pen or use a variety of stickers to make numbers 1-24. I have A LOT of random scrapbook stickers in my stash and rarely use numbers so I just used an assortment of what I had on hand.

Hang your advent calender and enjoy! Little ones will love ripping off the paper to see what treasure lies inside as they tick off the days until Christmas!