Adventivities.

I never got a chance to share some of our advent activities — or adventivities! So before I recap our December and then our year, I thought I would share some of the fun Christmas-themed activities and crafts we pulled together last month! We have a little advent calendar and each night, a small piece of paper appears (who knows from who!) and it reveals the activity of the day! Sometimes the activity is a larger outing — like to drive around and look at Christmas lights or go and meet Santa — but most days, it’s something smaller that we can do around the house without much pre-planning! The kids are so excited to check the calendar each day and always look forward to whatever we do!

Decorate a gingerbread house: This is the second year that I’ve purchased a pre-built gingerbread house and I don’t regret it one bit! They are impossible to build with kids! Unless you actually use a glue gun to adhere it together! Add a whole bunch of sprinkles, candies and icing — and who doesn’t love this activity.

Make Christmas-themed jewelry: I got a bead kit from Michael’s and one day the adventivity was to make a Christmas bracelet! Javi and Lola used stretchy string, but that was tricky for Eva so she made her bracelet with a pipe cleaner. Both methods work perfectly!

Letters to Santa: If you do Santa, no December would be complete without making a list! I couldn’t resist the letters to Santa kit at Target so that’s what we used on the day when this was the adventivity. The best part is that now we have a “to”/”from” stamp. It will get a lot of use!

Cookies: Making cookies ends up being a few days task in our house because everyone likes a different kind and my patience only lasts for one batch a day! Lola loves chocolate chip, Javi and Eva love m&m cookies, and I love peanut butter blossoms. And then I always think decorating sugar cookies just HAS to be done. So normally each Sunday in December the adventivity is to make a batch of cookies. It’s easy!

Painting crafts: I always pick up the craft kits from Target or Michael’s because they are contained! This year, I grabbed an ornament decorating kit and a wooden decor one. The kids love to paint + and these kits came with… glitter glue!

Christmas Sensory Table: On a dreary December day, a sure way to lift spirits is an indoor sensory table — especially if it involves baking soda and vinegar!

DIY Wrapping Paper: This paper roll was one of the best purchases of our early pandemic days! And again, it came in handy the day we made DIY wrapping paper as our adventivity! Some sponges cut into Christmas shapes (we did Christmas bulb lights, stars and trees) and then paint is all you need.

Decorate their rooms: At the beginning of December we decorate the first floor — with our decorations and tree and the whole nine yards… but the kids love the day we decorate their bedrooms! This includes getting new Christmas pj’s, changing their bedding to special Christmas bedding, swapping their books out for Christmas books and of course, adding a small tree in each room to decorate!

Here are some of the other adventivities we did this year!

• Town tree lighting
• Meeting Santa at the fire station
• Drive around and look at lights
• Hot cocoa for dessert
• Christmas wagon ride on a nearby farm
• Pick out our real Christmas tree

And on particularly busy days — the kids got a small gift (instead of an activity!):

• New pajamas
• Christmas shirt
• Christmas-themed playdough kits
• Christmas-themed puzzle
• A new ornament for their bedroom tree

How do you make December special?