I don’t know about you, but my children love nothing more than to spend time with family at Christmas. It seems that, at the end of a long school term, the things they crave are not actually material things; their anticipation is not of what presents they’ll get but what we’re going to do as a family. They want our time and most importantly our presence. 

This doesn’t mean you can’t get those important jobs done! We have just done something that ticked all the boxes (including one of mine: to clear out my office!!) This year we have taken some time to clear out a huge blanket box of photos, nursery drawings and crafts. My children have kept what they want to keep (which is most of it!!) and discarded what they don’t want. They each now have their own box, which we’ll put away for now. We’ll start the blanket box again and do the same in a few years’ time! It was lovely to see what they remembered doing and what came as a total surprise when they saw the photos of themselves!

Here are a few ideas for cheap / free family time activities (some of which also get jobs done!) over the holiday…

  1. Go and see the Christmas lights in your local high street. 
  2. Make some gingerbread men, festive biscuits or go all out and build a gingerbread house which makes a lovely Christmas Day table decoration!
  3. Make a list of Christmas movies – let each person choose their favourite and schedule one a night until Christmas day. Make your own popcorn for your movie nights – try some with Christmas flavours like cinnamon sugar.
  4. Take a long walk around a park or in the countryside and collect some pine cones and evergreen branches and use them to make your own decorations.
  5. Thinly slice some oranges and dry them in a warm oven – they make delicious smelling decorations and look beautiful combined with the natural cones and evergreen branches you have collected on your walk.
  6. Create a hot chocolate station with some festive additions such as candy canes and marshmallows.
  7. Make some home made treats to give as gifts. We made some simple chocolate bark by melting slabs of white, milk and dark chocolate on a baking sheet in the oven and then swirled it together with a tooth pick and topped it with holly shaped sprinkles. When it was cool we broke it up and put it in cellophane sweet bags tied with a red ribbon.
  8. Make your own wrapping paper – buy a large brown roll and make some stamps with potato shapes or use any festive stamps you may already have to block print your unique wrapping paper with festive paint colours.
  9. Recycle last year’s Christmas cards to make gift tags.
  10. Go on a scavenger hunt around your local neighbourhood – put 10 things on a card that your children have to find on your walk – give them a chocolate coin for each one they find!

Enjoy your time together and we wish you and yours a very merry festive period and a good break.

We look forward to 2025 with you all.

With love,

Charlotte and Team Debutots.