Whether your grandkids live near or far, creating Christmas traditions with them is not beyond your reach. Here are a few ideas for making lasting memories with these special people in your life.
1. Mail a Christmas Diorama
Light-weight paper dioramas fit well inside an envelope, making it easy to give a child their very own Christmas decoration. Whether the envelope travels many miles or down a few blocks, it is sure to delight the receiver. Here are a few of our favorite dioramas. You could send a different one each year, perhaps with a note of encouragement or love written on the back.
2. Let Them Help You Decorate
If your grandkids live nearby, invite them over to help you set up your Christmas decorations. Delight them with your trust by letting them set up displays and decide how the ornaments are hung.
You could also set up a kid-friendly Nativity together.
3. Gift the Family a Book
Each year, send your grandkids’ family a new book to enjoy during the Christmas season. Write a short note with your testimony on the inside cover. Here are two of our favorite Christ-centered books you could send:
The Spirit of Christmas
More Than Just a Star
4. Watch this Shadow Nativity
Youth in a ward in California re-enacted the Nativity in a unique, beautiful way: through shadows. Take a few minutes each Christmas season to watch a recording of the performance together, in person or virtually. Find it here: The beautiful Nativity reenactment you should watch this very second
5. Bring Light to the Home
Glittering lights have a way of enchanting both the old and the young. Consider placing a glowing lantern in a prominent place in your home each Christmas season. Dim the lights and invite your grandchildren to switch on the lantern. Then, read a scripture together or sing a Christmas carol. (Find more fun ideas on using Christmas lanterns here: A simple way to fill your home with Christmas magic.)
Elder Patrick Kearon said of the beauty of light at Christmastime:
“One of my favorite things to do as Christmas approaches is to sit by our Christmas tree, with all the other lights off, and let my vision go blurry as I look at the tree covered in tiny white lights. With my eyes out of focus, the glow of each individual light expands and softens as it reflects off the shiny red ornaments. The effect is enchanting. …
“As my eyes let the lights move in and out of focus on the tree, I am reminded once again of the divine mission of our Savior, which comes sharply into focus in these still moments.”
Here are two of our favorite lanterns:
The Spirit of Christmas Resin Nativity Lantern
Love’s Pure Light Nativity Lantern
Available at Deseret Book and deseretbook.com.
6. Make Clothespin Ornaments Together
This idea comes from a holiday tradition in Elder Gerrit W. Gong’s family. Money was tight during the Gongs’ first Christmas as a married couple. They saved funds from their tight student budget to purchase “a scraggly little Christmas tree even Charlie Brown would have felt sorry for,” Elder Gong said.
To help brighten the tree, Sister Gong used clothespins to create British soldier ornaments. “For [over 40] years, these clothespin British soldiers have stood at attention on our Christmas tree,” Elder Gong shared. “They remind us of our first married Christmas—far from home—and each succeeding Christmas.”
Elder Gong’s son and his family have since created their own clothespin ornaments—including one to look like Elder Gong!
Gather your children for a simple art project they can carry with them for years to come. If you don’t live near your grandchildren, consider making a clothespin ornament for them and sending it in the mail.
7. Offer a Spiritual Initiative
Invite your grandkids to complete a spiritual initiative or challenge during the weeks leading up to Christmas. For example. President Dallin H. Oaks and his wife Sister Kristen M. Oaks once invited their grandchildren to memorize “The Living Christ.”
To help younger grandchildren and great-grandchildren learn the words, they created accompanying visuals in spiral-bound notebooks. Those who completed the challenge even received a signed certificate.
Other challenges could include:
- Memorizing a Christmas hymn
- Memorizing a scripture
- Creating a Christmas-themed piece of art
- Doing five acts of service
- Writing a journal entry each day for the 12 days before Christmas
8. Work on a Gospel Puzzle Together
Puzzles create a great environment for great conversation. Put out a puzzle (whether the same one each year or a different one) and invite your grandkids to work on it with you when they visit. You could consider gluing the puzzle together after it’s complete and gifting it to your grandkids as a memento. Here are some of our favorite puzzles.
Arise and Come Forth 1000 Piece Puzzle
Dotting the Earth 1000 Piece Puzzle
9. Bake a Signature Treat Each Year
Some of the best Christmas memories are made in the kitchen. Find a simple but fun recipe to make together each year. You could enjoy the treats together and find someone in need to share them with. Here are some easy recipes you could try:
- Chocolate Snowman Cookies by Tara Teaspoon. Find more delicious recipes from Latter-day Saint chef Tara Bench in her cookbook Delicious Gatherings.
- Grinch Heart Cookies by Christy Denney. Latter-day Saint food blogger Christy Denney shares many more fun recipes in her cookbook Scrumptious.
- Chocolate Reindeer Cookies by Six Sisters’ Stuff. Find more Christmas recipes in The 12 Days of Christmas with Six Sisters’ Stuff.
10. Gift an Age Milestone Marker
Consider giving your grandchildren the same Christmas gift when each one turns a certain age, such as 8 or 12. This could be a picture of the Savior, scripture-marking pens, a journal, a simple Nativity, or a mini Christus statue. Grandchildren will look forward to their turn to receive the special gift from their grandparents.
For example, President Dallin H. Oaks bought pocketknives for all of his sons and grandsons when they were little. The tradition came from watching his own father buy a boy a pocketknife. The Church News writes that one day, when President Oaks was a child, he and his father, Lloyd Oaks, were looking through the window of a sporting goods store. A shabbily dressed boy joined them, gazing longingly inside. President Oaks’s father invited the boy inside and bought him a pocketknife.
“I want him to have a pocketknife,” President Oaks remembers his father saying, “because he doesn’t have a father to buy one for him.” President Oaks’s granddaughter Tiffany Bratt has always been inspired by her great-grandfather’s example in that story. She says she appreciates her grandfather’s desire to honor his father and connect with his extended family.
“The love and attention he’s given us and the priority that he’s made each of us as his family members has ... inspired me and helped me throughout my life to feel the love of the Savior,” she said.
Find more inspiration on enjoying a Christ-centered Christmas in the links below:
▶ This insight from Pres. Holland is the perfect Christmas Eve message for your family
▶ Captivate your grandkids with this storytime video about Santa and Jesus
▶ 20 ways to serve on Christmas Day
