PLANNING YOUR HOLIDAY TRADITIONS WITH A REFILLABLE ADVENT CALENDAR
Purple Vosges Chocolate Night Before Christmas Advent Calendar repurposed.
Does your family rock an advent calendar?
Growing up, I coveted those dollar store chocolate calendars come December 1st. As an adult with my own kids, I made sure they always had cool calendars filled with the fancy chocolatey treats, or lego, I wanted growing up, except they didn’t think they were that magical.
Instead, like so much of parenting, the gift I was trying to give my kids, the one I didn’t have, became just one more, terrible, awful, stressful thing for us to fight about. Parenting is such a bummer like that sometimes isn’t it?
When Katherine and I blended our families she and Adventure brought with them the magic we had been missing. Blending traditions is no joke, when blending families. There was some resistance trying to figure it all out, but Katherine, and her beloved, purple gourmet chocolate advent calendar from Vosges Chocolate, she had gifted herself years before were an instant hit.
As an LGBTQ+ Family, and a blended family, with lots of folks loving lots of kids, we make a lot of our own Christmas traditions up as we go along, and this one is my favourite yet!
Katherine explaining our family advent calendar to the kids our first Christmas together.
December 1st is a big deal FOR THE NORTH FAMILY!
It’s the day the Christmas festivities, and the Advent Calendar begin for our family!
Our family LOVES a good tradition. So much, in fact, that we have empowered our kids to declare almost anything a tradition.
If we love it, and they want to do it again, we simply decide it’s a tradition. Who knew that’s all it took, huh?!? Traditional Trimming of the Tree Chocolates, Jolabokaflod- A Flood of Books, and home made cinnamon buns Christmas morning. check. Check. And CHECK!!!
But of all our family’s Christmas traditions, the cornerstone of all of our Christmas celebrations is our purple, advent calendar.
It’s like the master of ceremonies for this magical season.
Our Family’S Holiday Advent Calendar
This beautiful box of Katherine’s, once filled with fancy, delicious, chocolates has become the symbol of our family Christmas.
Drawer by drawer, day by day, youngest to oldest we open up the day’s advent activity.
What Activities Are In Our Family Advent Calendar
Sometimes the activity is drinking hot cocoa. Others it’s singing carols while baking cookies, or putting up decorations. Sometimes it’s cleaning your room to make space for your new things, and others it’s @declaredominion ‘s favourite activity, colouring in our Christmas colouring books. A tradition Katherine brought with her from her own childhood.
Whatever the activities are, big or small they bring us together each day for a bit of magic, where we create our Christmas traditions and memories together. It gives us all something to love, hope, and connect over as a team. Suddenly your little brother is a little less annoying, when you’re drinking hot chocolate and watching Frosty the Snowman.
Sleeping under the Christmas tree, in matching family pyjamas, 2017
How Does Your Family Count Down To The Holidays?
This purple box of joy is the best part of our Christmas magic.
What about you? Where does this season’s magic live for you and your family?
If you celebrate Christmas do you do an advent calendar of some sort?
If you don’t celebrate Christmas do you have your own way of counting down to your special holidays?
