10 Family bonding activity ideas for Christmas preparation

Greetings from WolliMolli team! 

The calendar is even more closely approaching the Christmas day, and many families are already starting the Christmas preparation. We in WolliMolli believe that this festivity period is a time to express appreciation to one and another, especially to our dearest ones – family. 

In today’s post, we would like to share ten unique and family bonding activities that will bring the Christmas spirit into the house. Besides, it will be an excellent gateway for taking time off from the busy daily routine, and maybe even create a new Christmas tradition in the family foundation.

1. Ice skating and skiing - Time is a great time to engage in winter sports activities such as skiing and ice skating, which is an excellent investment for health and also fun. In case if your family hasn’t been engaged in similar winter activities before, it will be a fun and bonding experience to learn and support each other together in learning something new.
   
   
2. Sledding - this beautiful and snow abundant weather, it would be highly recommended to do sledding together in the hill near to the house, or a specially developed area for this. The sledding afternoon can be followed by tea or hot chocolate ceremony at home while watching Christmas movies together.
   
   
3. Selection of the Family Christmas tree - a tree is a must-have element for any Christmas season, and organizing a tree’s selection activity for sure will bring a festive spirit in your home as well. It will be a fun and engaging experience to do with your loved ones.
   
   
4. Self-crafted holiday tree accessories - Picking up the Family’s Christmas tree, the entire family can be engaged in the decoration process. In the case of family members have some spare time, an additional suggestion for bounding and creativity would be self-crafted Holiday tree accessory development. The Christmas ornaments can be made of natural ingredients, such as cinnamon sticks and rosemary branches, wooden beans, and other materials. For more inspiration, please visit this site: https://bit.ly/36N3kpd
   
   
5. Decorating the house - To bring a festive spirit not only to the room where the Christmas tree is located, use opportunity with your family to place the self-crafted Christmas ornaments in other rooms of the house, such as kitchen, living room, bedrooms. The Christmas ornaments could be mistletoes, wooden, and gingerbread ornaments. Organize this activity as a creative adventure! 
   
   
6. Gingerbread cookies - In Latvia, an essential part of the Christmas season is the smell and taste of freshly cooked gingerbread cookies. Gingerbread cookie cooking afternoon would be an engaging activity for both your family members and closest family friends. The youngest family members can be engaged in the cookie glazing process or dough rolling and cookie form development. Activity will also be great for developing a personal season’s greeting – the cookies can be a wonderful gift to work colleagues or close friends. For more challenges, a family can be engaged in the Gingerbread house creation process; however, it usually requires more cooking experience and is more time-consuming.
   
   
7. Creating DIY Christmas cards - Christmas card development will be a creative and fun activity, which can turn out in a surprise greeting opportunity for your friends and loved ones. You can organize a contest for developing the most creative Christmas greeting cards. One of the ideas would be developing cards which would be decorated with colorful ink and fingerprint and greenery stamps. For more inspiration, please check out this post: https://bit.ly/2srrhTW
   
   
8. Preparing a Christmas poem list - Christmas poems as a tradition for receiving Christmas presents. Has it also occurred to you that after receiving the second Christmas present, you feel lost in poem choice? Organize a poetry archive afternoon activity with your family members to discover beautiful Christmas poems to cite during the gift exchange on Christmas eve. 
   
   
9. Supporting others in need as a Family - Christmas time is a beautiful season where everyone can reflect give back. Donating and supporting others in need will be a brilliant family bonding activity that will inspire and empowering for the power the meaning of love and kindness. Some of ideas would be to engage in Emotional well-being support campaigns, such as Angel post (“Enģeļu pasts”), which provides campaign’s participant with an opportunity to prepare a warm Christmas gifts for elderly people, donating charities which help for children at Christmas time or donating materials for dog shelters, such a blankets, dog leashes, toys. Starting a charity supporting at Christmas time as a tradition will be a beautiful experience, and it will also encourage parents to teach children invaluable lessons for charitable giving and empathy.
   
   
10. Christmas angel selection activity - WolliMolli would like to share an idea of our team member’s family tradition. The activity is called “Christmas angel selection.” The organization process of the activity requires pre-preparation. The family member names are written down on the paper sheets, then one by one, the activity’s participants have to pick the sheet, which reveals the person for whom you will be a Christmas Angel. As a Christmas angel, you will have to develop a Christmas card in the form of an angel, inside of which you will have to leave a personalized Christmas wish or excellent remarks, such as what you love about the person the most, what are you grateful for. The cards should be developed as a Christmas tree decorations, which will be hanging in the holiday tree during the Christmas eve. Please keep in mind that angel names can’t be revealed until Christmas. During Christmas Eve, the family can organize a revealing angel activity, where a person will look for his Angel, most preferably during or after the gift exchange.