Smiggle Advent Calendar 2019 Review

Reviewed by Louise Totton

There’s no two ways about it, advent calendars aren’t what they were! In my day, we raced downstairs in the morning to open the door to be greeted by a festive image. I actually remember the excitement the first year that my brother and I got a chocolate advent calendar (I had Dairy Milk, he had Mars), and the very real novelty of there actually being something behind that door for us. Not content with chocolate any longer, or possibly because we are trying in vain to reduce sugar intake in the lead up to the massive Christmas morning sugar rush!

Chocolate intake aside, it is a lovely idea to choose an advent calendar that contains real treats – ones that you will really enjoy and that will last longer than a few seconds of the morning that you open the calendar door. There are lots of choices, from whiskey filled calendars for dad to scented candles for mum and even little toys for younger children. But what about the older kids, who probably consider themselves a bit too old for toys, but who would really appreciate a little treat just for them? My daughter is 10 and is bonkers on stationery – in particular stuff from Smiggle, so the Smiggle advent calendar seemed like a perfect choice for her!

The Smiggle Advent Calendar is enormous! It’s much larger than a standard chocolate advent calendar, and it would have to be to house all of the fabulous goodies that it contains – it really is the stationery lovers dream! The calendar is available in just one colour option, which I think is great to see as I see no reason why girls and boys need different versions of basically the same thing. The picture on the front is a lovely festive scene, featuring Santa, reindeer, festive mice, Christmas trees and gifts, and even a flying Christmas unicorn, all sat within a snow globe!

As you would expect with an advent calendar, there are numbered doors spread across the calendar, but these ones are even more interesting than on some calendars because they are all different shapes and sizes! The kids loved trying to guess what kind of product might be contained inside the compartment before we opened it, and it’s particularly nice that these things can then be kept and used rather than being gone in an instant, as they would be if they were an edible gift.

We loved the gifts that the calendar contained – they really were lovely and I thought that they were very generous. They were things that the kids genuinely loved and there was a good mixture of products there – I had expected it to literally be paperclips, erasers and maybe a pen on Christmas Eve, but there was an awful lot more than that – I won’t spoil it by saying what was given on which day, but the calendar contained:

This is a fabulous advent calendar and we have been over the moon with it. it’s definitely a great choice if you are looking to get the kids away from a chocolate calendar, or even just to really treat them with something that they’ll love. One of the gifts in the calendar is a Smiggle pencil case, so all of the items can be stored nicely inside once Christmas is gone, and they’ll all stay together and tidy.

This isn’t the cheapest advent calendar on the market, but it is a lovely one and would make a real treat for a Smiggle-mad child. This one is a definite top marks product and we have absolutely loved it.

Rating: 5/5 

RRP: £28

For more information or to buy visit www.smiggle.co.uk.