Christmas countdown paper chain printable – a task for every day

A paper chain that gets shorter every day until Christmas: 24 links in red, green and gold, each with its day and a small thing to do together – bake, sing, call the grandparents, make snowflakes.

Print it
Open one by one

How the countdown chain works

Hang the chain up on December 1. Every morning or evening a child tears off one link – the one with the lowest number – reads the task out loud, and you do it together that day. The chain gets shorter and shorter, and when the last link comes off, it is Christmas Eve.

How to make the chain

  1. Print at 100% scale on plain or colored paper of 80–120 gsm.
  2. Cut out the strips along the dark outline.
  3. Start with the last day: roll its strip into a ring, number facing out, and glue the end onto the gray field.
  4. Thread each next strip through the ring before it and glue it closed the same way, down to day 1 at the very end.
  5. Hang the chain up – on a door, a shelf or a curtain rod.
  6. Each day tear off the link with the lowest number and do its task together.

Tape or a glue stick holds the rings faster than liquid glue. Write your own ideas on the blank strips – or swap in one for a task that does not suit your family.

All the tasks, day by day

  1. Write your letters to Santa
  2. Cut out paper snowflakes for the windows
  3. Watch a Christmas movie under a blanket
  4. Call the grandparents and tell them your news
  5. Sing a Christmas carol together
  6. Make a pine cone bird feeder
  7. Bake gingerbread cookies
  8. Have a board game night
  9. Make Christmas cards for family and friends
  10. Do a good deed for a neighbor
  11. Color in a Christmas coloring page
  12. Read a winter story aloud at bedtime
  13. Make a paper star for the window
  14. Do a Christmas jigsaw puzzle together
  15. Take an evening walk to look at the lights
  16. Make hot cocoa and tell stories from when you were little
  17. Pick out toys to give to other children
  18. Draw the snowman of your dreams
  19. Have a Christmas quiz at dinner
  20. Decorate plain paper and wrap presents in it
  21. Dance in the kitchen to Christmas songs
  22. Decorate the Christmas tree
  23. Write down three good things about this year
  24. Christmas Eve – leave a cookie and a carrot for Santa

Also useful

Drawing names for gifts too? Secret Santa on santa.haus.

Print it

Know someone who would like this? Send them the link – it opens on any phone or computer.