Christmas Fare

Sara loves Christmas, she gets really excited about it.  This year, we are making the whole month of December a Christmas celebration, not just one day.  I made the kids a punch calendar/advent calendar where they punch a new hole every day to reveal a small toy, candy, and a family activity.

So far we've punched days 1-4.  Sara got to do the first punch and the first night our family activity was driving to see the city's light show.  On the second punch, Brennan got to punch it and he scored more candy and they got to write a letter to Santa.   Here is Sara's letter that she wrote.  She says it says that she wants a doll and a Nutcracker Soldier

Here is a video I shot of the day 3 punch, it was Sara's turn again.  She was so excited that she had me call Daddy at work to see when he'd be home.  Then she hardly let us eat dinner.  She punched out a snowman pez dispenser and a Santa one for Bren and our activity for that night was singing Christmas songs.  We all took turns choosing a song, Brennan picked Jingle Bells every time, it's his favorite song (he played bells while we sang).  Sara got us all books to hold like song books.  It was fun and joyous.

On day 4, it was Brennan's turn to punch, he was a little bit afraid.  One of the toys that I put in the box in a spot they haven' t punched yet has been playing loud music and flashing lights, it has kid of scared him.  I thought it would be funny. 

He was pretty reticent to punch the hole tonight but we helped him some.  They got some more great candy and the family activity was making snowflakes.  Everyone really enjoyed this activity a lot.  Brennan just go to cut random scraps of paper and he was happy doing that.  Dan is a master snowflake cutter so he cut snowflakes for and and showed Sara how to do it.  Sara didn't have the dexterity to do the scissors very well so he let her draw patterns on the paper  or suggested various shapes that he then cut out for the snowflakes.  I mounted them on colored paper and we will hang them up in Sara's window and her wall to make it look festive.

I'm really excited to do the rest of the punch calendar.  I think it's really helping us focus on family time and the season and make the most of it and I'm glad that so far it has worked and the kids like it.