An At-Home Holiday Season
We will be one of many families staying home this Holiday Season. A time of year we typically spend bustling around and traveling to ultimately spend time gathering with loved ones, becomes a low key season at home with just the 5 of us.
It may be different than what we’re used to, but this year has taught us a thing or two in being flexible. Just like our candy hunt in lieu of trick or treating on Halloween, we’ll be filling our days with other kinds of activities and making new traditions.
I’ve been brainstorming this week on how we have still been making this time fun for the family, and came up with 5 things we have done or hope to do this year!
5 Things To Do With Your Kids This Winter
Keep reading for a breakdown of these 5 things you can do with your kids this winter !
1. Make Homemade Decorations and Crafts
2. Bake Up Some Fun
3. Family Movie Night but make it Holiday Style
4. Learn about Traditions Around the World
5. Help The Community
Make Decorations and Holiday Crafts
I’ve always been a creative person and making seasonal crafts is one of my favorite things to do! Getting to share the fun with my kids and watching their creativity blossom is such a joy! Try making a traditional dried orange garland (tutorial coming soon!), handmade holiday cards, or salt dough ornaments for your tree! You can even add some magic to snack time by making holiday themed arrangements with their snacks (who says we can’t play with our food!?) The options are endless with handmade!
Bake Up Some Fun
Get the kids in the kitchen and teach them some recipes this holiday season! Do you have a favorite recipe that has been passed down through the generations? Have you been wanting to try some cookie recipes you’ve pinned on Pinterest? Now is the perfect time to do it and make some new memories and traditions in the meantime. My Gluten Free Italian Christmas Cookies are a hit in our house and my Gluten Free Snowballs Recipe and Gluten Free Gingerbread Cookies are coming soon!
Family Movie Night … But Make it Holiday
Like many families, we have dubbed Fridays our “Family Movie Night”. Every Friday for the past few years, we’ve taken turns choosing a movie to end the day with, ordered pizza from our favorite local restaurant, and cuddled up as a family – no phones, no video games, just quality time.
We’ve turned this into a Christmas Movie Night for the month of December and you can too! All we do differently is to limit our movie options to Christmas movies, and have hot coco after pizza! We usually turn on our electric fireplace and have the Christmas tree lit up for an extra cozy feel, and sometimes we’ll turn the kids’ room into a fort and watch on a laptop.
Learn About Traditions Around The World
With the world at our fingertips these days, it’s never been more simple to find the information we seek. Being home for extended periods of time (since March for us), it can be easy to feel isolated and alone. Why not exercise your sense of wonder and nurture feelings of connection by learning about Holidays around the world?
I believe it’s so important to teach our kids that everyone has different traditions and cultures and that they make the world a beautiful, dynamic, and rich place! Do some Google research, look up YouTube videos, and even have a go at some crafts and recipes from around the world this season!
Help The Community
If you follow me on Instagram it’s apparent that I love my small town. With more people struggling in the country than ever, there is a massive need for support within the community (there is always a need, but now more than ever). There are tons of ways to help, whether from home or in person (while being socially responsible of course!)
A couple options could be gathering things around your home for donations. You could donate warm clothes and coats, shoes in good repair, and gently used toys. My kids love finding things they can donate to other kids that will love them! You could grab a meal from a local restaurant, necessities from a neighborhood grocer or market. You can head to small businesses in the community instead of big box stores. If you are in a place to do so, you can even adopt a family to buy gifts for this Christmas. Find your community’s website or social pages and look for ways you can help in your community!
Auburn Locals, here are just a few resources for ways you can help:
Check out my post How to Support Auburn, CA businesses during the pandemic .
Pay It Forward Auburn Facebook Group is always posting community needs and ways to help, like the Annual Toy Drive
You can help the Placer Food Bank in their fight against hunger in the community.
You can donate to or adopt a family through Kids First
These are just a few ways you can help the community this season!
Home For the Holidays
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And there you have it! As you can see, there are many ways to still make this at-home holiday season a special one. I hope this post inspires hope and creativity for your and yours.
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KIMILOVE 
These are some great ideas and thanks for sharing some ways to help locally this holiday season!
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Thank you so much! I am going to add more resources as I come across them!
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