Advent Calendar Ideas for Families
Activity and experience advent ideas
Every year when December rolls around, I want to make the season feel meaningful without overloading our schedule or my purse. Most of our favorite memories are the little things we already do during December: like baking cookies, watching holiday movies, and all the crafts. That’s why our Advent calendar is full of little activities and experiences instead of trinkets or more candy.
For us, it’s less about adding more to the already jam-packed month and more about slowing down for the things we already love doing. If you’re using my free printable Advent cards, here are some easy ideas you can write on them. Most are things you can do right at home!
1. Decorating the Christmas Tree
We do this as a family every year, so why not make it part of the advent calendar? If you want to make it even more special you can turn on some holiday music, or gift everyone a small ornament to add to the tree every year. We like to get both kids a new ornament and that way when they’re older and they go out on their own they will have a nice collection of ornaments to start with.
2. Camping under the Christmas Tree
Have a tree sleepover night! Set up your sleeping bags and watch holiday movies and it will be like a fun indoor camping experience. Might be best to do this on a night when schedules feel a little more lax or before you get presents under the tree.
3. Christmas movies
No holiday list of Christmas activities or events would be complete without Christmas movies! Want to take it a step further? Do a “taste the movie” night with your favorite holiday film. Home Alone would be an easy classic one with kid food like pizza, mac and cheese, and ice cream sundaes!
P.S. – if your family fights over which movie selection to make this tip is for you! Everyone gets to pick their favorites and put them on a slip of paper and put them in a jar. Then on movie nights everyone gets a chance to draw.
4. bake Christmas Cookies
There’s always one day where make a bunch of Christmas cookies. I like to do it once the kids are out of school on a day we have zero plans where we can literally spend all day making different kinds of Christmas cookies. Everyone gets to pick a favorite kind to try. Read more below to know what to do with all the cookies…
5. Make Christmas ornaments
There are so many kinds of ornaments you can make depending on your kids skill level, cost, and the effort you’d like to put into it. You can make these for yourself to hang on your tree or gift them to family. Grandma’s in general really love homemade ornaments. Here are a few different ones we’ve done in the past you could consider:
6. give Christmas Cookies to neighbors
If you’re not doing a cookie exchange, then gift some to your neighbors for the holidays! My kids love walking down the cul-de-sac handing out the cookies that they put time and effort into making and seeing the neighbor’s faces light up is always a treat.
7. read a new Christmas book
This one can get harder, but usually every year we can find a new book to read. As my kids have gotten older we’ve even done bigger chapter books that I read to them at night. One of their favorites that they are already asking for again this year is The Christmas Pig and I highly recommend it if your kids can sit through a chapter book with little to no photos.
8. make paper snowflakes
Thankfully the internet exists now so you can look up fun ways to make paper snowflakes for any age. Search up a few videos and your kids will think you’re the most magical snowflake maker ever!
9. Write a letter to Santa
We do this every year also. The execution has varied from year to year, but the past few years we have gone to Cabela’s and done the photo with Santa and there they have a letters to Santa station where kids can write out their letter and put it in the mailbox. If you want to receive a letter in the mail from Santa, there is a way to do that! Read more about how to do it, here.
10. make and send Christmas cards
Making Christmas cards can be as time consuming or fast as you want it to be. If your kids want to create little words of art you can definitely do that or you can be like me and buy some premade sets of cards for them to draw and decorate the inside.
11. diy gifts
This is where I try hard not to go overboard. I love making diy gifts for people and the kids love to help me do it! So every year we make some gifts for friends, family members or teachers in our lives. One of our favorite go-to’s are what we call booboo bags. They are fabric we sew into different shapes and fill with rice. You can mix in scents or dried plants as well. We usually do lavender, but this year we’re going to try chammomile. I’ll try to put a post together to show some of the crafts we’ve made throughout the years.
12. holiday crafts
Holiday crafts are in the same boat as DIY gifts, but I think of them more as decoration around the house that we make. This can be a painting, paper chain, garland, etc. There are so many directions you could go but I suggest to think about your kids age when deciding what kinds of crafts you want to make together.
13. visiting Santa
Like I mentioned, we usually go to Cabela’s every year for that standard Santa photo and it’s always quick and easy. Did I mention it’s free? Yeah… about that. Most of the ideas on here are ballin’ on a budget because the holidays can add up real quick. Having said that there are SO many fun places to see Santa and if you are in Austin you can see him at COTA’s Peppermint Parkway, or on the Polar Express Train ride, or at several different holiday pop ups. Plus so many photographers invest in having Santa and making it fun.
14. library events
Do not sleep on library events! Not only are they free, they’re fun! And a great way to be social and invite some friends along for a meetup. Which leads me to…
15. library books
If you don’t have the budget for a gazillion holiday books, just get some at your local library! Most libraries have an online catalogue and the ability to put books on hold for pickup making it even easier to go snag a few without having to keep them long term. And don’t forget the audio books! You could have a Christmas book read aloud during some of your crafting time too.
16. go ice skating
Depending on where you live and what’s available this one can be trickier, but ice skating is always on the list for us. My daughter took lessons and really loved ice skating for a few years and we still love going during the holidays.
17. go to your city’s Christmas tree lighting ceremony
I absolutely love going to the town Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony. We don’t always get to go, but it’s usually a fun event. In Austin there’s caroling first at the Capitol and then everyone makes their way down to the tree and does a big countdown. Every town, big or small, has some variation of the tree lighting ceremony so check your city’s schedule and this is a fun way to get the season started.
18. Go Christmas Caroling
Christmas caroling can be a little daunting, but there are ways to make it easier. One is to go as a group with friends! Another is to consider going around to people or family you know. Let them know you’re coming and I bet they’ll have a little treat for the kids at the door. Another sweet idea is to go to a nursing home and go caroling. If all of that still feels like too much, you could sing at home and record it to send grandma.
19. Christmas COLORING PAGE
There are a million coloring pages and definitely options for different ages as well. You could buy a coloring book at the store or just find one at home to print. I challenge you to take it a step further and consider turning a family christmas photo into a coloring page!
20. DO A CHRISTMAS PUZZLE
Several stores have holiday puzzles that are fun to do as an activity together with family. Elevate it with treats or hot cocoa and don’t forget to put on a festive playlist! Make it hard enough to be challenging, but easy enough for the age of your kiddo.
21. Drive around and look at Christmas Lights
You likely know some of the fun places in your area to go look at Christmas lights. In Austin there’s a huge range of options from free to paid. If you’re unsure ask a local mom’s group and just wait, they’ll share so many options that you’ll really be trying to figure out how you can go see all the lights before December is over. Don’t forget the popcorn and hot cocoa!
22. CHRISTMAS KAROKE OR DANCE PARTY
Christmas Karoke is such a fun activity that kids LOVE! If your kids feel to shy to sing or can’t read yet, you could do a dance party. There’s also a lot of holiday freeze dance videos and songs you can find that make it more interactive.
23. CHRISTMAS SENSORY ACTIVITIES
Kids love sensory activities and they are fun ways to destress and play. You can purchase fake snow to play with, make snowmen out of playdough, make holiday themed slime, etc.
24. SIDEWALK CHALK CHRISTMAS MESSAGES
I think sidewalk chalk messages became more popular during COVID, but if you live in an area that’s not covered in snow in December (hello, Texas!) then you will have ample opportunities to trace your kids and let them draw themself like a gingerbread man. Speaking of which…
25. ACTS OF KINDNESS
Acts of kindness are always worth the effort and there are so many options all of you can do together as a family and some kids can do on their own. This isn’t a complete list, but just some ideas I had while writing this post (you can also use previous ideas and turn them into acts of kindness as well!)
26. BUILD A GINGERBREAD HOUSE
There are so many options these days for gingerbread house kits and if you want to be extra you could make your own! However in this house, I do not have that patience or time. If you want to amplify this everyone could get their own house and have a set amount of time to complete it and then get friends and family to vote on the best one with some sort of simple prize… like whoever gets the most votes gets to eat theirs first!
27. POLAR EXPRESS NIGHT
Get a large cardboard box and build a simple train car to your kids imagination! Turn on the movie and they will love making it comfy and watching The Polar Express. If you want to jazz this one up they could eat dinner in it too!
28. HOLIDAY BREAKFAST IDEAS
Christmas breakfast ideas don’t have to be limited to Christmas morning! You can make a lot of pancake variations from Santa, to reindeer, to snowmen the options are unlimited! I will say there are A LOT of pancake ideas though! lol
29. HOLIDAY PHOTO EVERY DAY
Not for the faint of heart for those with little kids, but there are a lot of fun cute holiday photo ideas out there. There are the present box photos, Santa photos, photos in front of the tree, matching pajamas, the photo where it looks like the light is coming out of the book, Christmas light photos, etc. In the end, it’s probably not as hard to find things every day to capture, but might feel like a lot depending on your kid’s enthusiasm. Solid advice from a photographer here! lol
30. HOMEMADE SANTA PLATE
There are kits at the craft stores for homemade Santa plates you can reuse every year for cookies or keep making a new one every year until everyone has one for the Christmas day or morning! Another option is to hit up a potter painting place where they fire it in the kiln for you.
31. DIY WRAPPING PAPER
Buy a roll of kraft paper and paint it or decorate it with stickers or stamps. If your kid is into drawing or other forms of art you could also work that in.
32. PURCHASE OR MAKE A NEW ORNAMENT YEARLY
Personally, I love giving my kids ornaments on the day we decorate the tree as a little gift. Then after they move out they’ll also have a whole set of ornaments I can gift them that are sentimental.
33. CHRISTMAS GAMES
My daughter requested a specific game this year, but there are a lot of holiday games that already exist. You could do a holiday song Pictionary version, a Christmas bingo type game, a scavenger hunt, and there are always holiday versions of card games also!
34. Christmas Pajamas
Every year growing up we would open a present on Christmas eve and it was Christmas pajamas. I loved this tradition and I may keep it, but I am considering doing it earlier in the holiday season so that we can enjoy them longer plus kids always have pajama days or we like to take different holiday photos with our Christmas pajamas already on. Or you could be extra and do two!
How to Use These Advent Activity Ideas
Write your favorites on the printable Advent cards, mix in a few blank ones for flexibility, and skip any day that feels like too much. Some of the best Advent memories happen when you don’t overthink it. A little tip to make it even easier… have some candy or toy back up days if life gets too hectic! Between the holidays and my kiddo’s December birthday this idea has saved me on multiple occasions.
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