4 Ways to Have a Great Holiday Season

4 Ways to Prepare for and Enjoy a Great Holiday Season

It’s hard to believe Thanksgiving and Christmas are just around the corner. When you’re a busy mompreneur, preparing for a great holiday season may inadvertedly drop to the bottom of your to-do list. However, properly and proactively planning and preparing will help you make this a great season for you and your family. 

Below are four ways you can prepare for a great holiday season.

1. Create consistent family traditions.

Create consistent family traditions that you and your family can enjoy each year. Traditions may include things like going on a Santa train ride or using the weekend after Thanksgiving to cut down and decorate a Christmas tree. 

Consider other traditions like what foods you’ll eat on each holiday. While Thanksgiving has many popular traditional dishes, that doesn’t mean your family can’t put their own spin on Thanksgiving traditions. 

In my home, we always incorporate some Ghanaian food (and sometimes, dessert) into the dishes, jollof rice being my usual go to! 

At Christmas, many families have turkey, ham, or beef roast. However, your family can make a tradition out of any meal. Over the years, I’ve heard of a variety of traditions: a getting pizza with family on Christmas Eve, making tamales for the Christmas meal, and even a couple that goes to the restaurant they met at the day after Christmas.

The quality of your traditions is important. What you do as a family should be something that you all consider fun most of the time. In recent years, Elf on the Shelf has gained popularity, with parents creating elaborate situations to share on social media. 

However, fight the urge to keep up with the Joneses on social media. Your family’s traditions should be fun and meaningful to you, your spouse, your kids, and any extended family that visits over the holidays. 

It is perfectly okay to not partake in a tradition that doesn’t work for you or your family.  I, for one, have yet to succumb to the elf of the shelf tradition, and I don’t plan to 

2. Plan ahead.

“Failing to plan is planning to fail” – Benjamin Franklin

One of the best ways to prepare for the holiday season is to make plans ahead of time.  Don’t wait till the last minute for ‘boredom’ to kick in and then scramble to plan something.

Decide what you and your family will do to celebrate the holidays and put these events on the calendar. When things are on the calendar, you’ll be able to plan your work schedule around these key family events. 

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While many of us love the idea of being spontaneous, you can’t always afford to be spontaneous when you’re running a business. Sometimes that “spontaneity” requires careful pre-planning. If you want your children to have that spur-of-the-moment fun event feel, you might plan it as a surprise for them. 

One way to ensure that the whole family can participate in plans is to keep a family calendar. You can use a print calendar in the home or a shared digital calendar. If your children are old enough to have smart phones, using a shared family Google calendar can help keep everyone informed about upcoming family plans.

3. Have fun! 

Make sure mama is having fun too. 

Don’t do something just because everyone else does it. Make sure all of your holiday activities provide fun, quality time for your whole family. 

This is a great opportunity to ask your children what they want to do during the holidays. One mom I know grew up with a grandma who didn’t buy gifts. Instead, her grandma took each grandchild on an outing of their choice. This lady recalls memories like going to the craft store with her grandma, while her sisters enjoyed a day shopping for clothes at the mall. 

I especially LOVE ‘experience’ gifts.  It provides an opportunity to for a quality ‘bonding time’ whilst also being clutter free!! Win-win!! 

As your children grow, they may have different preferences. While one might want to help decorate the Christmas tree, another might want to spend time baking Christmas cookies with you in the kitchen. Make sure your kids, especially the older children and teens, have input into leisurely activities to help engage them in family events. 

And it is worth repeating.  Make sure that you (or your spouse, depending on who typically plans holiday activities; in my home it is me and I love it!!) are planning activities that you yourself(s) really enjoy as well.  If mama is not having fun, it’s hard to create a genuinely enjoyable experience for anyone else. 

It is your family - curate a holiday experience that takes your personal preferences and personalities into account. 

4. Keep Celebrations Christ-Centered.

Thanksgiving and Christmas are important times to mark everything God has done in your family’s life. Although Thanksgiving is not a religious holiday, it offers an opportunity for your family to express gratitude to God for the blessings He’s given.

Christmas is all about Jesus coming to earth as a baby for the salvation of the world. Don’t get so wrapped up in holiday plans that you forget why you’re celebrating Christmas in the first place! As your family celebrates, make sure your family’s faith informs your holiday activities. 

Many families read the story of Jesus’ birth on Christmas morning (or on Christmas Eve). Something I started doing last year was read a chapter of the book of Luke the first 24 days of December.  Luke has twenty-four (24) chapters so it is perfect for an Advent read!  It will now be a new tradition for the whole family, something we do along with opening our advent calendars.   

Although it is easy to get wrapped up in the excitement of presents, people and holiday punch, it’s important that Christmas is remembered as more than presents and festivities. 

You may even consider taking time during the holiday season to serve in your community. Volunteering at a food pantry around the Thanksgiving holiday is a great way to not only serve others outside of your family but also importantly, to model service to your children.  And serve as a somber reminder that others are not as fortunate. As you remember in gratitude all the ways you’ve been blessed, you can be a blessing to those in need. 

Conclusion

The holiday season is a hectic time, especially when you have young kids at home. With pre-planning and intentional effort, you can create a fun holiday season. At the end of the day, what you do doesn’t matter as much as who you do it with.  And why you do it.

In the spirit of giving, I’ve created a simple holiday guide for you.  This guide, titled “Holiday Planning Guide” will help you balance all your priorities while still creating a happy holiday season that you and your family truly enjoy.  To download this free holiday planning guide, click here.