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I feel you on the non-junky thing! I am, admittedly, an annual buyer of the LEGO City Advent calendar, but my kids and I have enjoyed lots of other Advent calendars as well. Here are a few to think about for this year, arranged very roughly by age from youngest to oldest. Many of them are currently on sale for Black Friday and, as long as you order ASAP, will still arrive by December 1.
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When my older daughter was around 2 years old, she received a set of wooden animal blocks from HABA — a gift my in-laws carried home from Germany — and played with them daily for at least a year. By the time you’ve opened all 24 doors of this HABA farmyard Advent calendar, you’ll have a similar collection. And because the blocks aren’t really holiday-themed, they have lots of longterm play potential.
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My sister and I have five kids between us, all girls, who currently range in ages from 3 to 10. Last year my dad gifted every last one of them a Squishmallows Advent calendar of their own and won the Grandpa of the Year award.
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If any of your grandkids wear Crocs, this Advent calendar will set them up with an array of holiday Jibbitz.
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“Junky” is always going to be a little bit relative, right? If they’re into sensory toys like fidgets and slime, Nee Doh makes about the highest-quality “squishy toys” you can get. This Advent calendar contains 24 holiday-themed blobs for kids to squeeze and squash.
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My young rockhounds both appreciated this National Geographic Advent calendar, which reveals a new gemstone each day. The final gift is a “dig,” in which kids can chisel a crystal out of a larger piece of rock. (If their interests lie elsewhere, NatGeo also sells space-, dinosaur-, and magic-trick-themed Advent calendars.)
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There’s a bag of colorful air-dry clay and a QR code behind every door of Hey Clay’s Advent calendar. Once you download the brand’s how-to app, each code will take you to video instructions for building that day’s “character.” The box also contains a sculpting tool and enough hooks and string to turn each creation into a Christmas ornament, if you want.
KiwiCo has several project-based Advent calendars that let kids make something small every day. When my daughters were 5 and 8, they had a ball adding to the Santa’s Railroad and Christmas Village scenes all throughout December, but this year there’s also a version that will make 12 mechanical holiday ornaments.
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This science Advent calendar is one we liked when the girls were 6 and 9 — you get to do a mini-experiment every day, and they cover a variety of simple, interesting concepts.
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Success! You’ll get an email when something you’ve saved goes on sale.
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Even though Bonne Maman’s annual jam calendar is not aimed specifically at children, this one has been a favorite in my family for years. We taste and discuss the flavor of the day each morning over toast. And once the little jars are empty, they’re eventually put to use in all sorts of craft projects.
For the kids who do like LEGOs, as I mentioned above, I’m an annual buyer of the LEGO City Advent calendar. That one and the new-for-2025 Minecraft edition are unfortunately sold out unless you’re willing to pay a reseller’s markup, but the Star Wars, Harry Potter, LEGO Friends, and Frozen ones are still available.
Want to be emailed when products you’ve saved are over 20% off?
Success! You’ll get an email when something you’ve saved goes on sale.
Yes
Want to be emailed when products you’ve saved are over 20% off?
Success! You’ll get an email when something you’ve saved goes on sale.
Yes
Also for tweens and teens who are into makeup and skin-care — or at least the idea of it — this Ulta x Mini Brands Advent calendar is full of tiny replicas of popular beauty products. (If they’re into blind-box miniatures, this is a good one to get.)
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Not gonna lie, these are empty cardboard boxes. But they’re ready to fill with whatever trinkets or treats you think the children in your life will like best, plus they have only 12 spots, which means you still have a couple weeks to get them ready. The possibilities are endless, from Hot Wheels to Bluey characters to animal figurines. Or do as senior editor Ailbhe Malone’s mum used to do and write a surprise “activity” note for each day — “sometimes you’d get a mundane task like Unload the the dishwasher, but other days it would be Get McDonald’s for dinner, which was always one of my favorites,” she recalls.
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