Whether you have a completely packed holiday season, complete with travel and family gatherings, or a quieter few weeks off with just you and your little one, it’s important to keep the learning and entertainment going! Mommy and me classes may be finished for the year, but that doesn’t mean you can’t have some quality time with your little one doing some fun holiday activities for kids. Here are a few of our holiday-themed DIY preschool activities for you and your little one to enjoy together this holiday season!
Christmas Specific
If you want to indulge in the Christmas holiday traditions and excitement, try these holiday activities for kids:
Roll the Dice Christmas Tree Game
This great DIY holiday activity for kids helps with both counting and hand-eye coordination. All you have to do ahead of time is draw a Christmas tree with a star on top and add a few numbers. Your little one will roll a die, count the dots on it, and then pick up a sticker to place on top of the number on the tree. Before you know it, you’ll have a tree full of sticker ornaments!
This one might need a little more prep time than mommy and me classes, (and maybe cost nearly as much, too), but if you do any sort of Advent Calendar activity, one where books are the prize will pay off over and over and over again. (Plus, there are some money-saving tips in the instructions to this holiday activity for kids, so go ahead and indulge, or prep for next holiday season!)
This holiday activity for kids is very similar to the Roll the Dice option, just with letters instead of numbers, so your little one can practice school work outside of preschool and mommy and me classes!
This DIY doubles as both a great holiday activity for kids as well as a heartfelt gift to give to a loved one! Just make sure your little one feels their creativity is honored!
Whether your little one loves the excitement of putting a puzzle together, or simply lining up the numbers in the correct order, they will love this game! (Just be aware this requires a little more prep ahead of time for you, so be sure to break out all the art skills you want to showcase and share with your little one.)
Winter Holidays
These DIY holiday activities for kids can be done whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Yule, or simply the changing of the seasons:
Getting ready to give gifts to friends, family, or the teacher of your favorite mommy and me class? Simply let your little one color inside (and outside) of the lines of doilies with a sponge on top of a big roll of paper, let it dry, and wrap up the presents with your little one’s creation!
Like the doily wrapping paper, this fun DIY holiday activity for kids relies on painting around what’s already on the paper. Watch your little one’s eyes light up with wonder and delight as their snowflake (or tree) reveals itself underneath all their beautiful painting choices!
Whether you have a few extra clothespins laying around, or a whole pack of popsicle sticks you haven’t figured out what to do with yet, gluing these materials into a snowflake shape and giving your little one some paint and a paintbrush will give them the opportunity to express themselves creatively (and help with their fine motor skills!)
Another great winter-themed preschool activity that will help them develop their fine motor skills – all you need are some pipe cleaners twisted into a general snowflake shape and beads, and your little ones will be ready to play, create, and continue to develop those necessary skills!
Break out your cooking and chemistry skills (something you might have gotten some experience in, depending on what mommy and me classes you’re taking!), and create your very own, home-made play-doh. Don’t be daunted – these DIY instructions also have extra troubleshooting tips from our very own Miss Charlotte!
New Year’s
Your little one is probably fascinated by both the concept of a whole new year, and the idea of staying up till midnight to see it happen. Whether you actually let them stay up all night, or celebrate with a time zone that turns to midnight a little earlier for them to still keep their consistent bedtime, here are a couple of New Year’s specific holiday activities for kids your little ones will enjoy (that you might have already seen in our previous blog post on Playgarden Online):
Many little kids love to make noise, and having your little one craft their very own, unique noisemaker is sure to be an exciting holiday activity for kids they’ll enjoy and remember! All you need are plastic plates, beads, popsicle sticks, and plenty of glue.
After glueing some popsicle sticks into a star, your little one can have free creative reign in this holiday activity for kids. Make sure to display this beautiful star prominently after they’re done and the star is all dried!
Travel
Traveling with your little ones this holiday season? Keep them occupied while traveling, or utilize the places you are traveling to with these travel-ready holiday activities for kids:
This is a great preschool activity to set up ahead of time, and have your little one occupy themselves in the car. This DIY is a great one to help your little one develop their color recognition and matching skills, and all you need is some cardboard, stickers, and colored clothespins!
Another great car-ready preschool activity for your little one to play with during all the holiday travel!
This one may be especially exciting to little ones from NYC who rarely get to take nature from the outside into their homes. If you’re somewhere a little more woodsy, you can go out with your little one, collect some sticks, and then outline them and play a matching game with them afterwards!
These are only a few of the wonderful DIY activities we have here at Playgarden Prep! For even more ideas for holiday activities for kids, preschool activities, or anything to do with your little one outside of mommy and me classes, check out the rest of our DIY projects here!
