Countdown to Christmas: Teaching Kids to Give During the Holidays

With decorating, buying gifts and preparing for the big dinner, the holidays can go buy in a blur. Before you know it, Christmas has come and gone and plans for decorations and activities will have to be saved for next year. But there’s no need to fret because Julee from Warm Hot Chocolate has you covered. Read on as she shares her fun idea for enjoying the season, counting down to Christmas and teaching her kids the importance of giving during the holidays!

I love the way advent calendars weave holiday excitement into the month of December, but I’ve never been a big fan of giving our children extra gifts leading up to a day full of even more gifts. I know I sound a bit Grinch-like, but our children have SO. MUCH. STUFF.

This year, I’m trying a new way of counting down to the big day. It’s a more low-key approach and one that, hopefully, will also shift the focus from getting to giving.

Here’s the plan: Every couple of days, a secret letter will arrive in the mail. Each letter will let Jason and Jenna know the number of days until Christmas and will include a message about celebrating, sharing and giving back during the holidays. Some days, they will be given a “secret assignment” (selecting books to donate, for example); some days, they will receive encouragement about how awesome they’ve been; and some days they’ll receive a reward for their good deeds.

To carry out my idea, I’ve ordered a set of custom gift tag stickers and return address labels from Tiny Prints and created a letter template to match.

To keep things interesting, I’ve also assembled a variety of envelopes, small boxes and other materials to serve as packaging for the letters. I’m not sure about other children, but my kids love receiving mail and the simple act of opening up a letter or package every few days will be exciting in itself. They’re young enough that I don’t have to actually mail anything through the postal service – I can just place them in the mailbox.

I’m so excited to send the first letter. Here’s a sneak peek:

The editable Photoshop template is available here.

I’ve also started compiling the list of giving assignments and activity-based rewards:

What do you think? I’d love to hear more ideas for my secret letters and for helping kids learn about being charitable during the holidays.

Shop: Gift Tags | Address Labels

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