This is excellent, peeps!
The wise and hard-working women at New Zealand Baptist Children and Family Ministries have produced a fantastic Advent resource for families to use through December at home. It’s called Christmas @ Home and I warmly recommend it.
It isn’t a do-one-every-day kind of Advent journey. Rather, it’s a vibrant collection of ideas to pick from (heaps of great things to add to my Advent activity mega-list here!).
There’s a nice range of craft, science, service, games and other activities, each framed by a Bible story or text and a conversation starter to help you make the most of the time, as appropriate for your household.
Each activity is well thought out and well explained, and is designed for kids and adults to do together to enrich family time in the lead-up to Christmas. Lots of the family activity ideas would also transfer well to other times of the year.
Also, they’re easy!
Simple craft and science ideas, family service activities, games with the props included in the booklet for you to cut out and assemble, and all in a sturdy, colourful booklet you can use for the next few years.
Seriously, order a bunch now and give one to all your friends. They’re just NZD$2.50 a pop.
Here are some of the family activities in the booklet (these are my groupings, just to give you an idea of the range):
Satisfying Christmas craft activities for older kids
- The Jesus story ‘exploding circle book’, with shapes to cut out from the booklet
- Edible nativity set (making a gingerbread stable etc)
- Christmas Crackers
- Felt tree decorations
Easy, low-prep activity ideas
- Dress-up nativity
- Advent paper chain (with 24 ideas and Bible references supplied)
Fun Christmas games for a crowd
- The ‘left/right game’ with supplied funny version of the nativity story
- Nativity ‘who am I?’ (a version of 20 Questions with a mystery name stuck on your forehead)
Kid-friendly service ideas – adaptable for any time of year
- Food hamper donation activity
- Visiting a rest home
- Acts of service voucher making
- Christmas-themed chocolate bar wrapping
- Cookie-in-a-jar gift, with recipe included
Activities to get kids thinking
- Super sand
- Joy box
- Colour fantastic (food colouring science demo)
Traditions to begin
This is a great section!
What a good idea to inspire families to begin a new Advent or Christmas tradition they can come back to each year.
- Advent wreath and candles (see also my version of this that has worked really well for our family)
- Box of blessings
- Christmas book basket (definitely also check out – and add to – my list of Jesus picture books)
Thanks heaps, Karen and Marelize at BCFM, for all your work on this really excellent resource. I think this is a great collection that has something delightful to suit most families who want to spend December focusing on Jesus – even just a little bit!
You will have picked up that I have a fair few Advent and Christmas resources on this ‘ere blog by now. Here are some quick links if you want to catch up:
Advent with Kids: 76 Ideas for Getting Ready for Advent
What We’re Doing This Advent: 6 Households Share their Plans and Traditions
47 Christmas Gifts that can Change the World
10 Christmas Picture Books (that actually feature Jesus)
And you are warmly welcomed to keep in the loop and connect beyond this site by following Sacraparental on Facebook (daily extras), signing up for email updates (the box at the top right) and/or following me onTwitter and/or Pinterest (the Advent board will be particularly relevant just now!).
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