Top Ten Christmas Activities to Do with Your Child

Christmas offers opportunities to spend time as a family at every turn. Use these ideas to spend time together and reconnect. Maybe your child will find that Christmas is about more than just presents; it's about family, too.

Set up the Nativity together. Without Jesus, we wouldn't even have the holiday, so what better way to teach your child the wonders of Christmas than by retelling the Christmas Story while setting up the Nativity.

Christmas cards for everyone! Think about some groups that might be cheered up by receiving Christmas cards - nursing homes, wounded soldiers, soldiers overseas, daycare centers - and get creative! Work as a family to create Christmas cards for the group that you choose, and then either hand deliver them or look online for an address to send the cards. You will certainly make someone's Christmas a little more special!

Make Christmas ornaments for family and friends. Have you ever tried to buy gifts for everyone that is important in your child's life - aunts, uncles, grandparents, cousins, great-grandparents and so on? It can get ridiculously expensive! So why not spend the afternoon making ornaments together? You can buy ornament kits at any craft store - try to find ornaments that incorporate a picture of the child. I also like to make bags that the child can decorate that say: "Made with Love For _________." Not only do you occupy a Sunday afternoon, but your child is learning the importance of giving as opposed to receiving.

Plan a Christmas themed Family Night! Pull out the old classics - Miracle on 34^th Street, the original How The Grinch Stole Christmas, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Charlie Brown's Christmas, or whatever movies you loved growing up. Order a pizza, make some hot chocolate and enjoy one another's company.

Visit the Angel Tree. Every community has some sort of Angel Tree - a place where you can choose a child's name and purchase Christmas gifts for them. Allow your son or daughter to choose a child, and then take them shopping. Give them a price range to stay in, and allow them to choose the gifts. Then let them wrap all the presents when they get home. They will love knowing that they helped another child!

Preheat the oven and get cooking! Some of my best memories are of baking Christmas cookies with my mom and grandmas. Crank up the Christmas tunes and get the kids in the kitchen! Stock up on all kinds of Christmas sprinkles and let the kids go crazy! They will love knowing that they had a hand in making the Christmas cookies that all of their family and friends are enjoying. After a day of baking, my grandma would have us deliver cookies to all of her neighbors - they loved seeing us kids, and it made us feel good to know that we brightened someone's day!

Clean out the closet! A tradition that my husband and I have decided to continue comes from my parents. Every December, my brother and I were asked to choose two or three of our toys to donate to a charity. The reason was two-fold - it taught us to help those in need and it also cleared out the closets for the new toys that Santa would be bringing.

Sing your hearts out! When is the last time that carolers came to your house? Get your family and friends together and go door to door through the neighborhood singing your favorite Christmas songs. My grandma loved to get all of us together to carol in her neighborhood - she even had us carry candles! Then head inside for some cookies and hot chocolate.

Take a drive. Spend one evening driving through your community looking at Christmas lights. People are getting more and more creative with their light displays, so you never know what you will find! Don't forget to bring the Christmas CD's, so you can have a sing-along while you drive!

Read the newspaper! Every community has Christmas events throughout December - you just need to find out what they are. My city has a Gingerbread Walk - downtown displays gingerbread houses in store windows that members of the community have built. It is great to see what people have come up with, and there are houses from kids and all the way up to professionals. Most communities will have breakfasts with Santa, light displays, house tours and more. Find out what's available and get out and enjoy all that your town has to offer!Enjoy your holiday season - and enjoy time with your wonderful family, too!