Christmas Countdown: It's Not Too Late



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Albright's Home
Every December

 When you are asked about Christmas traditions from your childhood, what comes to mind?  Every family is unique and establishes it's own traditions - some of them carefully and intentionally implemented and others just sort of happen.  Traditions from my childhood include putting up the Christmas tree as a family with Christmas records playing in the background, decorating sugar cookies, counting down the days until Christmas on an advent calendar my Aunt Faith made for us one year as a gift, laying on our bellies in front of the tree carefully studying the nativity set under the tree, and reading (or as we got older quoting) the Christmas story Christmas morning.



Christmas Countdown Chain

 We have established a tradition in our family that counts down the days until Chrsitmas, starting with December 1 (thank you, LeighAnn for your inspiration).  Our Christmas Countdown includes a Christmas-related activity for each day.  I typically have made a paper chain - one chain link for each day - with an activity written on the inside of each link.  Then every morning, my children open the chain link to discover what Christmas activity they will enjoy each day.  Over the years I have created a master list of activity ideas (50 of them), which is included at the end of this blog post.

While I could be verbose and wax eloquent on the whys and hows of our Christmas Countdown (just be thankful that I'm not publishing my first draft of this post), I will let the following pictures be my thousands of words.  Here is a snippet of our Christmas Countdown from last year.

Decorate the Tree

Watch a Christmas Movie

Have Snowman Pancakes

Make Cinnamon Ornaments

Decorate Stockings

Candy Scavenger Hunt in the Tree

Make Popcorn Garland



Sleep in the Living Room



Decorate Cookies

Paint Wooden Ornaments

Make Graham Cracker Houses

Take Cookies to a Church Family

And so we enjoy the whole month of December together as a family establishing traditions we will treasure as memories someday.

Obviously December is already four days in, but why not count down the last 12 days until Christmas?  I love that my children have a visual representation of how much time remains until Christmas actually gets here.  While I found a paper chain to be a very easy way to execute a Christmas Countdown, there are limitless possibilities in visual represpentation of a Christmas Countdown.  This year we have a ribbon strung on the wall above the couch.  There are 25 clothespins each holding an envelope which is opened each morning to reveal the day's activity.  My sisters, Jill and Julie are both doing Christmas Countdowns with their husbands this year.  Below are pictures of their displays.  Also, click here for countless more ideas. 

Joanne's Countdown

 

Joanne's Countdown

Jill's Countdown

Jill's Countdown

Julie's Countdown

Julie's Countdown

Master List of Christmas Activities

1. ABC Christmas Photo Scavenger Hunt
2. Call Mammaw and wish her a Merry Christmas
3. Christmas Caroling to older people
4. Create your own Christmas word search
5. Create your own Christmas crossword puzzle
6. Decorate a Christmas cake
7. Decorate stockings (from the Dollar Tree – we will use these stockings on Christmas day)
8. Dip pretzels in chocolate
9. Download two new Christmas songs from itunes
10. Drink hot chocolate after school
11. Drive around looking at Christmas lights
12. Eat a Christmas treat for breakfast
13. Eat breakfast in bed
14. Eat Christmas Pizza (in the shape of a candy cane - pepperoni makes stripes)
15. Eat dinner backwards (as in dessert first and salad last)
16. Eat fondue for supper
17. Eat snowman pancakes for breakfast
18. E-mail an E-card to your cousins
19. Find kisses (as in Hershey’s) in the tree
20. Get a new Christmas pencil/pen
21. Get a new Christmas ornament
22. Give candy canes to your friends at church
23. Get Frosties at Wendy’s
24. Go to a Tree Lighting Ceremony
25. Have a Candlelight Dinner
26. Have a Football Day (dress in team gear, play Madden, eat hotdogs)
27. Have a friend over for the afternoon
28. Indoor snowball fight (with wadded up newspaper)
29. Make and  mail a Christmas Card to a friend
30. Make candy trains
31. Make cinnamon ornaments (lots of recipes for this online – just “google” it)
32. Make salt dough ornaments
33. Make donuts (canned buttermilk biscuits, fried in oil, and then dipped in sugar)
34. Make garland for the tree (popcorn, cheerios, fruit loops)
35. Make graham cracker gingerbread houses
36. Make homemade green and red play-doh
37. Make and Decorate Sugar Cookies
38. Make Oreo Pops
39. Make Snow Globes (glass jar, small ornament, water, glitter, glue)
40. Open a present (usually gloves or socks or a small toy)
41. Paint Christmas ornaments (I buy the wooden ones at JoAnns)
42. Paint Christmas Pictures (finger paint on paper)
43. Paint the Windows with Tempera paint or Homemade Window Paint
44. Pick out something at the dollar store
45. Put a Christmas treat in your lunch  (Reese’s tree or Snickers nutcracker)
46. Put up the Christmas tree
47. Read Christmas stories by the light of the tree
48. Sleep in the living room with the tree turned on
49. Take Christmas treats to the neighbors
50. Watch a Christmas movie