Jingle Bugs

While listening to a parenting podcast on the topic of Christmas, I came up with some new traditions.

The family counselor was discussing how to keep Christmas fun,

 without just focusing on the gifts part.

He mentioned to start traditions for the whole season.

This is particularly helpful if money is very tight  due to job loss. 

The children won't be let down because mom or dad lost their job,

 but they will still be excited for the whole season.

I loved this. 

And it was something I decided to incorporate into our parenting. 

Our neighbor, who absolutely loves Christmas has a tradition I have since started. 

She has Christmas books (the same Christmas books every year). 

The books only come out at Christmas and get packed away with the decorations after Christmas.

She wraps them and numbers them. 

Every night they unwrap a book. 

Some of the books have an activity that goes along with it, 

and not a major activity something pretty easy.

So this year I started ordering Christmas books to begin our Christmas Library.

The first book, "Jingle Bugs". 

B loves this book, and I highly recommend it.

 

Our activity after was making jingle bells. 

I already had the pipe cleaners, 

and I bought the bells at Hobby Lobby with a coupon for $1. 

Cheap and easy entertainment for a 2 year old. 

Now she marches around the house with her bells singing "Jingle Bells".