The first door

Welcome to the first day of December.
I set a personal challenge for myself, based on the tradition of the advent calendar. I intend to post something each day. Other than advent calendars my challenge will go until the 31st, though. Feel like going on a little ride with me?

A good start would be to talk about the history of advent calendars. The first advent calendars were found in the 19th century, but not in printed form yet. Instead children cleaned off one of the chalk marks that had been made on the door. Sometimes little religious pictures were hung up.There is a little confusion about when the first printed calendar came out, 1902 or 1903. Early forms were pieces of cardboard on which children could glue little pictures. I'm glad they weren't used anymore when I was a kid, you know my strained relationship towards glue.
The advent calendars that most of us probably know came up after 1920. There were little doors in a piece of cardboard which usually showed some romantic snowy town or wood, behind those doors you found little pictures.The first calendar I can remember had a Christmas tree behind door #1. I never quite understood that because our Christmas tree was put up on the 24th.

1958 another popular form came out, the calendar filled with chocolate.

Today there is almost nothing you can't find in an advent calendar. Chocolate, little toys, vouchers, even jewelry in some cases!
There are audiobooks with a story for each day.
There are online calendars and "calendars" on the radio.
Or take a look at this one. I got it from my pet supply store, not for me, no no no, for my cat! But why didn't they send me four of them then? ;-)
And of course there are still many handcrafted calendars out there. How about you? Do you have one? And if you do, what does it look like?