Easter:
1. Lenten calendars are not as popular as Nativity calendars, so I made mine. Using clay, we formed 40 little bowls (you may want to make a few extra). I glued cloth to a pizza box and cut out a spiral to put the bowls on. You will need a stone or marble for each bowl. I also purchased a purple candle to symbolize Christ’s royalty. Each day, you light the candle, read a verse and put the stone in. You can look online for Easter verses.
2. In our house “The Easter Bunny” hides the kid’s Easter baskets for them to find after church on Easter Sunday.
3. We dye eggs and have a big Easter egg hunt after church too. There are eggs for the little one, middle ones and older kids. After the hunt the older kids have an egg war.
4. Resurrection Eggs: There are 12 eggs each telling a different part of the Easter story. We hid these inside and then open them one at a time and remember the Easter story.
5. This is a great time to learn salvation verses like: John 3:16, Romans 5:1 & 8, Psalms 119: 9-11, Romans 3:23, Romans 10:9 & 11, Romans 1:16
Christmas:
1. We start our Christmas festivities on December 1st with waffles and ice cream for breakfast. We have Christmas music playing and homemade waffles with all sorts of toppings like: whipped cream, strawberries, chocolate syrup, maple syrup and ice cream.
2. Gingerbread houses with the cousins: When it works to do this on December 1st, we try, but regardless we get together to make gingerbread houses. My sister-in-law has a mold that she pre-makes the houses and we all bring icing and candy and decorate the houses. It’s a crazy time as our children are young but they have a blast.
3. Advent countdowns: I have quite a few advent calendars. One with little boxes with a character for each day from the Christmas story, ending with baby Jesus in the manger, one with a reindeer counting down the days with a bell, one with a Christmas tree with a present for each day to put on the tree. I also have a long silver piece of cloth that I wrap 6 M&M’s in bundles for each day of December. This is my cheap way of doing a chocolate advent calendar. We also have 25 Christmas books that we wrap up and open one every night in December, leading up to Christmas. In our house after dinner we do our advent calendars, everyone has one to open, then we read the advent book and on each Sunday in December we light the Advent wreath candles and read the Scripture that corresponds. If you are looking for Advent calendars, look after Christmas or at garage sales.
4. Practicing thanks: Each of my children has a small linen bag with their initial on it. After we do our advent calendars, they exchange bags with a sibling and “shop” in the house for something to “give” that sibling. It can be anything from a tissue to a toy. Then they give each other their presents and practice having grateful responses to gifts they may or may not want. To start, the giver says “Merry Christmas” and the receiver says, “Thank you (and the child’s name)”. Then they open the gift and say thank you again and think of something nice to say about the gift, like I like this color or this would be useful if I had a cold, etc.. It ends up being very funny because of the gifts that they pick to give each other. Then we put all the gifts back and collect the bags. I’m not sure why but my kids LOVE this game and it does help with thankful responses on Christmas day.
5. We have family night once a week. In December we try to use these nights to get all our pre-Christmas celebrating in. The first week we decorate our tree, complete with our traditions of Chick-fil-A party platter, the movie, A Christmas Story playing, and Christmas music. We give our children an ornament each year to represent their year, so as we decorate we look at all their past ornaments. The second week we make Christmas cookies together. The third week we bundle in the car in our jammies, with hot coco in a thermos, and go look at Christmas lights. You can really play this up by giving each child a ticket for the “Polar Express Light Show”. We also try to make a point of watching our Christmas movies during December. Our favorites include: Frosty, Rudolph, A Christmas Story, Home Alone, Christmas with the Kranks and White Christmas.
6 . Music and Scripture: It is amazing what young kids can memorize. Christmas is a great time to work on the Luke 2 passage (1 -14 or 6- 14). We also sing Christmas carols together so that they know more than jingle bells by heart.
7. Nativity sets: I love my ceramic nativity set, unfortunately so do my toddlers, so I purchased the Little People interactive nativity figures and they love to play with that. So the ceramic one can stay intact and they can still interact with baby Jesus.
8. Elvin the Elf: Long before everyone had Elf on the Shelf, we have had a mischievous elf who does mischief in the month of December. The kids love to look for him in the morning and see what he did the night before.
9. Snowman soup: This is basically hot chocolate with mini marshmallows, a Hershey kiss and a candy cane to stir.
10. Cookies, carrots and reindeer food. I have a little plate that says, cookies for Santa where we leave cookies and milk for Santa. This year my sister-in-law introduced us to reindeer food for the reindeer. You mix 1 part glitter and 5 parts oats and sprinkle it in your yard.
Valentine’s Day
1. We made a Love Bug Hotel out of cardboard boxes, complete with furniture for our love bugs, who visit us in the first 2 weeks of February, leading up to Valentine’s Day. We leave our love bugs dinner on their table and they leave us candy. We also have a journal where we get to know our love bugs and they get to know us. This year Twizzle and Slurp visited us every day except during heavy snow, when their wings would get wet and they couldn’t fly.
2. On Valentine’s Day morning the kids wake up to a paper heart by their bed. They follow that color heart on a treasure hunt to find their Valentine’s Day bag of treats. One year I did string, which worked well too.
3. In the Valentine bag’s I write a love letter to each of my kids where I tell them all the things I love about them.
4. Christmas cookies in the shape of a heart, make a nice Valentine’s Day treat.
5. This is a great month to learn the Love chapter: 1 Corinthians 13: 4- 8a
Memorial Day / Fourth of July:
1. I work with my pre-school and Kindergarten age children to put on an America program every other year. They learn patriotic songs and quotes and present a simple history of America. We do sign language to God Bless America and they have a parade with musical instruments and flags. The older kids participate too, but my Kindergartener is always the star of the show.
2. Crafts: There are so many ideas for Patriotic crafts and foods that I will spare you the details of ones that we have done. Pinterest and Family Fun are the resources I usually use.
3. This past year we found a local park that was hosting activities from the Revolutionary War period. They could sign their own Declaration of Independence, play games that colonial children played, see soldiers dressed in the uniform of that day, etc. It was a fun way to celebrate.
4. Parades and Fireworks: We are lucky enough to have the parade route come right by our house and we can see the fireworks from our front porch, but there have been other years that we have had to seek out these activities that make the holidays festive.
5. One idea I want to do this year is write letters to soldiers over-seas and send them a care package. I also would like to send thank you cards to veterans.
Fall Fun:
1. Getting ready for the first day of school. My kids paint a sign that shows the grade they are entering that year. The day before the first day of school, we wake up at the time they will have to for school. Everyone showers, gets dressed in school uniforms and eats breakfast. Then we take all of our first day of school pictures. That way on the first day of school I don’t have to worry about pictures and we have done a dry run on how long it will take to get ready. Everyone takes off their first day of school clothes and lays them out for the next day.
2. We have a tradition of getting donuts after the first day of school and ice cream after the last day of school.
3. If you are having trouble getting information out of your school kids, you can put a question under each child’s plate at dinner time for them to answer about the first day of school.
4. Pumpkin carving contest, apple picking, fall fairs and trick-or-treating are the things my kids look forward to in the fall. My husband makes the best pumpkin seeds so we are always trying to get our hands on as many as possible. The kids also enjoy apple sauce which I make with any apples that have seen better days.
5. Fall walks. This is our favorite time to go letterboxing and take walks at local parks. For more information go to www.letterboxing.org.
6. Thanksgiving: We have a Thanksgiving scrapbook that we add a page to every year that includes the things we are thankful for that year.
7. This is a great time to learn Psalm 100.
Festivus: We borrowed this idea from Seinfeld, and turned it into our own special holiday that we celebrate with cousins after Christmas. My kids look forward to Festivus almost as much as Christmas. Try inventing your own holiday with special things that your family enjoys.
1. Grievance Pole: This is the opposite of thanksgiving, a time to err all of the things that have bothered you for the past year. We write them on lists of paper and tape them on our Grieving Pole (a cardboard carpet role, cover in foil and stuck in a Christmas tree stand).
2. Stanley the Elf: We have this funny looking elf that goes to a different family member for the year. That person has to take picture of the things they did with Stanley for his album. To decide who gets Stanely, everyone stands in a circle and write a number on a paper. Then we pass Stanley around the circle for each number on the papers. Whoever ends up with him wins.
3. Feats of Strength: We tape off a big circle on the carpet. The kids challenge each other to a pillow fight. Whoever steps out of the circle loses. You can challenge groups of people too.
4. Money Exchange: The adults put money in various boxes and the kids participate in a Chinese Auction. There is always at least one jack pot.
5. Table Cloth: Every year we write on a table cloth with felt markers. The kids draw a picture or write something that is important to them that year.
6. Hot Rice with Almond: Everyone gets a bowl of rice. In one bowl is the almond. Whoever gets the almond has good luck that year. This is a Swedish tradition.
7. Games we play include: chocolata, craft competitions, stair monster and dart gun fights.
8. End with Festivus Quest and song. My sister and cousin make up the best quests to end each Festivus. They are said in Monty Python and the Holy Grailish language. We also show any videos at this time of past quests, accomplished. Then we end with our Festivus song. I’m telling you it quite the experience. Try inventing your own holiday or use some of these ideas.
Summer Fun:
1. Start off the summer with a “Bucket of Fun”, which includes: new water guns, buckets and shovels, goggles, swimmies, sun screen, sun glasses, bug spray, butterfly nets, bubbles, sidewalk chalk, etc. I usually do this on the first day of summer or the last day or school.
2. Go peach and berry picking at local farms.
3. Go letterboxing or geocaching. This is a great way to exercise as a family and enjoy local parks and trials. (www.letterboxing.org and www.geocaching.com. )
4. Roast marshmallow and catch lightening bugs after supper.
5. Tent in the back yard. We set up a movie projector for the kids to view a movie projected on the fence.
Birthdays:
1. Spotted cup: The tradition started with my sister’s spotted cup that says, “You’ve been spotted.” That she gives to her birthday kids and everyone goes around and says what they like about that child. We have a plate that serves the same purpose. It is nice for the birthday child to feel loved and appreciated on his/her special day.
2. Birthday signs: We make birthday signs for the birthday kid. Dad always makes them on the computer and Mom always colors them. They stay up for their birthday week.
3. Birthday parties: In the area that we live most of the parties my kids go to are at a venue. They are a lot of fun, and a lot of money, so we usually do a backyard party. Some themes I have done are: Starwars, army, Dora/ Diego, animals, movie theater, Valentine and this year I am working on a Ninja theme. There are so many ideas online on how to make a backyard party successful. We make our own piñatas out of paper mache. One suggestion I have is to make sure it’s not too long. An hour and a half I think is perfect if you have a lot of kids. Also plan more activities than you think you will have time for because time seems to stand still when you are hosting 15 six year old boys wielding swords.