I can remember as a child, my parents always worked to make ringing in the New Year feel special. It wasn’t actually champagne in my glass, but when you’re young, you don’t know the sparkling grape juice in your glass isn’t champagne…especially when the glass you’re holding was long stemmed and not made of plastic.
As we grow older, we may forget that the celebration of a New Year is for everyone.
Here are some ideas on ways to ring in the new year with your kids.
1. Make a slide show from your favorite photos from 2021. Whether it was a day at the water park or that baby’s first smash cake, a slide show tradition to document the year is one that can be enjoyed for years to come.
2. Blow up balloons for the hours leading up to midnight and write the hour on each balloon. As the hour comes, let the kids pop the balloon with that hour.
3. With a stack of paper plates, Popsicle sticks, glue (hot glue recommended), paint, and a little rice, you and the kids can make your very own shakers to use at midnight…or whatever time you decide the new year is.
Decorate your plates on the outsides, place the plate flat and put some rice or other noisemaker inside, glue the plates together with the Popsicle stick hanging out from between the plates to serve as a handle. Allow to dry and give it a test shake. Add more glue as needed if it doesn’t stay together on the first attempt.
4. So what to do with the left-over paper plates, aside from putting food on them another time, you can use a couple Popsicle sticks and glue one to the back side of a plate to serve as a handle. Blow up a balloon and you’ve got yourself a game of indoor badminton.
5. Do it yourself 2022 glasses with some pipe cleaners and a couple cheap pair of sunglasses. This is another fun and inexpensive activity to do New Year’s Eve. Pop the lenses out of the sunglasses and twist the pipe cleaners into the numbers for the year. Use a separate pipe cleaner to help hold the numbers together before attaching them to the glasses.
6. If you’re looking to make some keepsakes, sit down and write out your child’s name, the date, their age and what town you live in. Then, ask your kids about their favorite things such as movies, books, activities, games and so on. Tuck it away and do it again the following year. It will be a lot of fun to review down the road.
These are just a handful of activities you can do but the sky is the limit!
Lauren is a an award-winning journalist who decided after 10 years of newspaper experience to venture out. Hallmark Times was born.
