Fun, Friends and the Holidays

Posted by Cindy West | 0 comments

Our homeschooling group loves to get together during the holiday season for special celebrations.  Over the years, we’ve enjoyed many uniquely fun times together.  I hope you are inspired by one or two of these ideas for holiday group gatherings and enjoy sweet fellowship with your homeschooling group this season.

Ornament Making Party – Each family brainstorms a very simple and inexpensive ornament to make.  They bring enough supplies for the entire group to complete one ornament each.  Each family sets up a table for their ornament making station.  Parents man the stations, teaching the children how to make the ornaments as children go from station to station crafting.  In the end, each child goes home with several hand-crafted ornaments.  (One year, we chose to hand out our ornaments at the nursing home rather than keeping them ourselves.)

Cookies and Crafts Party – Each child (or family) is responsible for baking and bringing a batch of cookies to the party.  Families brainstorm a simple and inexpensive holiday craft and, much like the ornament making party above, kids go from station to station crafting.  Recipes and cookies can be exchanged – or you can just gobble up the cookies as you craft.  (Additionally, you could decide to hand out crafts and a couple of cookies at a local shelter of some sort, too.)

Food and Fun Party – Each child (or family) is responsible for making a festive food and bringing it to the party.  Parents each plan one fun game for the group and bring any supplies necessary.  (Our kids always love a present wrapping relay.)  Enjoy the food and fun games together and exchange recipes if you like.

Christmas Caroling at the Nursing Home – This is always a precious activity.  Be sure to get permission from the nursing home ahead of time and ask about acceptable foods if you plan to bring along any treats.  Meet ahead of time to practice the carols together!

Cookies for Firefighters Party – This activity is most enjoyable when everyone meets together in a big kitchen at a church or extension building to bake cookies together.  Each family brings supplies to make one cookie recipe.  Make the cookies, sample a few, and bag them up for the local firefighters.  Go together as a group to deliver the cookies.  Your firefighters will thank you!

Silver Packages Party – This activity works best if planned a few months before Christmas.  Read the book Silver Packages: An Appalachian Christmas Story by Cynthia Rylant with your group.  Challenge the children to save money in order to purchase a gift for a needy family.  If your group is small, take a shopping trip together to purchase the gifts, have a wrapping party and deliver the gifts together.  If your group is large, you might choose to simply meet somewhere for a wrapping party.   (Consider adopting a single child or family of children through an Angel Tree ministry, or purchasing random gifts to be delivered to a local toy and clothing drive.  If you plan to deliver directly to a particular child or family, it’s best that only one adult does that job.  It could be embarrassing to the family if an entire group shows up.)

Family Potluck Night – Too many of our group’s activities happen during the day when it’s harder for the entire family to be together.  We try to plan events once in a while to include everyone.  It’s a little harder to do around the holidays because of everyone’s busy schedules, but we have had success with a family potluck night.  Everyone brings a meat and side dish or dessert to share.  We plan a light program of Christmas carols and maybe a few family-oriented games.  One game that is tons of fun is balloon stuffing.  One family member from each family slips a giant sweat suit over their clothes and the rest of the family members have a certain time limit to stuff as many balloons in the sweat suit as possible.  The family who stuffs the parent full of the most balloons wins a small prize.

Have fun making memories!

I’d love to hear your ideas for holiday homeschool gatherings!

Cindy West is an eclectically Charlotte Mason mom of three who loves learning alongside her children. You can find her blogging at Our Journey Westward and find her nature study curriculum at Shining Dawn Books.