Make your own food bank donation box

This year we've decided to reverse the traditional advent calendar and invite people to #GiveALittleSomething and donate items of food to local food banks 🎁

A food bank or community larder is a place where people who are having a hard time can go, to get vital food for free. It is very important to make sure our food banks are well stocked all year round so they're able to help people when they need it most - especially at Christmas.

Every day from 1st -24th December we're running a Food Bank Advent Calendar - you can find out more about it here. Each day you can donate to your local food bank by popping a different item into the collection bins in our food stores after you've done your shopping.

You can also create your own collection box at home, work or school and build up your advent calendar items. This can then be delivered directly to your local food bank in the new year - when they may struggle for donations after the Christmas surge.

Whilst Santa's elves have been busy getting ready for Christmas - the big man himself has sat down in his workshop and made our own donation box so we can add a different item to it each day. Why not make one too - it doesn't matter if you put something in every day or just a few bits and pieces - it all helps.

What you'll need:

• A strong box - big enough to hold all the items you want to donate (remember though you'll be donating your box with the items inside so don't use one you need at home - just a cardboard one will work brilliantly)
• Anything you want to cover your box in - paints, glue, glitter, paper, card, tinsel, ribbon - we've used red crepe paper and ren and gold tinsel for ours.
• Glue/Sellotape
• Scissors

What to do:

1. Firstly, there's no right or wrong way to do this - as long as your box is strong enough to hold everything and is clean and dry, then you can decorate it however you want - Christmassy pictures, happy pictures, New Year pictures - anything you think might bring a smile to the faces of people receiving your donations!
2. To decorate we measured out some red crepe paper and cut it into a square shape big enough to cover the whole box
3. We then wrapped our box up like a present, sticking the sides down with Sellotape - don't forget to leave it open at the top so you can put your things in each day.
4. Then we wrapped our red tinsel around the sides, securing it at the corners with some double-sided Sellotape so you can't see it from the outside.
5. Once you've covered your box completely in red tinsel - we then wrapped a single piece of gold tinsel around the middle of the box - to make it look like a giant present - and secured it in place with Sellotape.
6. Then, we added a strip of tinsel from the top to the bottom of the box to finish off our 'bow'

We've popped an old bit of material inside the box but you don't have to as it'll be hidden when you've added your items into it - you can decorate inside though if you want to - it would be a nice surprise for those unpacking the boxes to find a nice picture stuck to the inside!