I am excited this year to do an activity advent calendar! Shayla is at the age where she can do so many fun things and looks forward to so many fun things so this year we are starting our activity advent calendar. I found a few great ideas online and from friends and have come up with 25 activities to do during the month to put in advent calendar envelope with the last 12 days and service days – the 12 days of giving to include the real spirit of Christmas in the activity!
Advent calendars are a great way to help kids understand how long they have to wait until Christmas. I am doing this and started planning it by looking on my calendar and include pre-scheduled events and activities (such as 'go to local Xmas Parade) in your advent calendar so that you don't wind up with too much to do on any given day. I printed out the numbers 1-25 on with pretty font and colors on address labels and put the stickers on individual envelopes and placed them with binder clips on red ribbon so we can open one each day (photo to come soon). Here is my list! I am looking forward for the fun to begin tomorrow!
ADVENT CALENDAR ACTIVITIES – Last 12 days are 12 Days of Giving!
1. Get out the Christmas Boxes and start decorating!
2. Make decorations to put on tree to be donated to Convalescent hospital
3. Attend a Christmas Party and meet Santa! (Our church one!)
4. Go see a Christmas Parade (The Fillmore one!)
5. Watch a special Christmas movie (Polar Express) Put our shoes out for St. Nicholas and carrots (for our St Nicholas Day)
6. Write letter to Santa
7. Make Gingerbread Houses
8. Have indoor snowball fight (with paper, cotton balls or nylons stuffed with cotton) and then drink hot chocolate!
9. Make handmade Ornaments (Moms group craft)
10. Kids Christmas Party and Ice Blocking!
11. Christmas Tree Train in Fillmore with Santa – Get our tree!
12. Tree Trimming Time – Decorate the tree!
13. Paint Our Toes in Christmas Colors!
14. 12 Days of Giving Starts! Visit Local Shelter to donate blankets and give love to animals
15. Make homemade Christmas cards for preschool and Sunday school teachers
16. Buy toy to donate to local toy drive at firefighters station
17. Donate Food to local food bank
18. Empty piggy bank and bring change to store for Salvation Army bucket!
19. Make Christmas Cookies to deliver to neighbors!
20. Go see Christmas Lights and beforehand make a thank you card for our favorite house to give to the owner!
21. Pick up trash on our walking path by the river
22. Make thank you card and goodies for our mailman (and much loved) UPS Man!
23. Choose some of our books to donate to the library
24. Take Cookies and Hot Chocolate to Fire Station. Read Christmas Story from the scriptures
25. Give a gift to Jesus – make a special promise to keep all year long!
Here are some other ideas that I could not fit on my list but really like and either already did or will probably do too:
· Go Christmas caroling. I like the idea of the kids using kazoos instead of singing as they can get really shy when they are singing!
· Xmas Cards to soldiers
· decorate the front window for the holidays
· make playdough to share at school (white with peppermint and red and green glitter)
· volunteer at the food bank
· make and send out a card to a soldier
· Christmas Scavenger Hunt
· Go see The Nutcracker (already did)
· Visit Santa in the mall (already did)
· See Holiday concert
· Visit local church’s nativity scenes
Here is where I got my initial idea
http://kidscraftweekly.com/advent_challenge2010_issue.html
2 comments:
Hi Larissa..Loved your list of 25 things. Did you know Polar Express was Amber's favorite Xmas movie? Hallmark channel is having non stop Xmas movies (almost) during December. Martha Stewart has about 2 or 3 shows a day also...all Holiday related now on Hallmark.
Great ideas, Larissa! I had to laugh when I read about the indoor snowball fight! I was just amazed at the ice blocking pics and the pic of Mitchel outside in December. That has to be nice! We just got over a foot of snow!!! Thanks so much for your package. You are so thoughtful! Have a great Christmas!
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