Countdown Blocks

I love looking forward to things.

Anticipation is right up my alley. I looked forward to my 16th birthday so much, that I made a gigantic paper chain and tore off a link every day for 6 months until the big sweet 16. So these countdown blocks are the perfect new addition to my Christmas decor. I know this is not an original idea, but this is what I did:

1. I started off at Home Depot, begging for wood scraps. I had a 2 x 4 cut for the base of the blocks and 2 blocks cut out of 4 x 4's. I spray painted the base green and blocks red and then roughed up my corners and edges with sand paper.

2. I found some cute Christmas paper on clearance at Hobby Lobby. I cut pieces for all 6 sides of each cube, plus one side of the base. Using my good friend Mod-Podge, I adhered the paper and smoothed out the bubbles.

3. I used my other good friend, the Cricut machine, to cut out the "countdown" letters and glued those right on to the base. I also cut out the numbers for the blocks using red, green, and white paper on the Cricut. In order to get all the numbers I needed (at least to countdown for a month), I used the following combinations:

Block #1 - Numbers 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

Block #2 - Numbers 0, 1, 2, 6, 7, 8

*The 6 has to also serve as a 9, so use a font that can be flipped over!*

4. I glued the numbers on, and voila! Check out some of the cute combinations:

I love these so much, I don't want to put them away. I am seriously considering making a set of countdown blocks I can use for any old occasion.