The day after Christmas can be a little depressing. The cookies are getting stale, some of those much desired toys looked a lot cooler on TV, regular food is boring after all those holiday feasts, the tree is starting to droop, and all the pretty wrappings are in the garbage. Here, it’s even too cold to be outside.
Here are some of my ideas for putting smiles back on those sad little faces.
Top off mugs of hot chocolate with whipped cream. Add a few sprinkles of colored sugar to the top. If you want to go all out give the kids a peppermint stick to stir the hot chocolate with. And if you have leftover chocolate chips or marshmallows you can throw a few in! A friend of mine calls this concoction snowman soup. I like to fill a mug about half way with the hot chocolate and add coffee for the other half. Sometimes I even add the whipped cream and extra chocolate.
Serve something spicy for dinner. After so many sweets and mashed potatoes, spicy food will taste extra good. Tonight we are having enchiladas, chips, and mango salsa. Since we are celebrating the Twelve Days of Christmas to top off the meal we will do our British Christmas Crackers.
Play a game together. Today my boys are still occupied with their new Wii games. If they weren’t I’d be suggesting a game tournament right now. For a game tournament you can use whatever you have – darts, air hockey, or Toss Across.
Two games I’ve used for school and tutoring parties both use Styrofoam Christmas balls. In the first you aim the Styrofoam balls at wreaths or empty boxes. In the second game you divide up the players and balls evenly. Mark the center of the room with a length of ribbon and let those “snowballs” fly. This obviously works best in a hallway or empty room. I’ve also made the rules a little more mellow by having the children sit and roll the balls to the other side. After a certain amount of time, the side with the fewest balls wins.
And now I think I’ll go find that hot chocolate.
Also See:
Another Fun Tradition – Christmas Crackers
Celebrating the Twelve Days of Christmas