Want to be mindful with your kids this holiday season? Then read our blog for 12 fun holiday mindfulness activities you can do with your kids!
The holidays are a time of limitless joy and excitment for kids. But while all that joy and excitement isn’t a bad thing, with it also often comes metldowns and a good old case of the “gimmies.” Either way, the Holidays are an amazing opportunity to cultivate mindfulness in your kids!
These are 12 amazing, and festive mindfulness activities your kids will love for the holidays. From peppermint hot cocoa meditation to brain dump snowflakes, all the way to Christmas tree pose, these holiday mindfulness activities will be fun, holly, and jolly for you and your kids to partake in this holiday season.
How do I practice mindfulness with my kids during the holidays?
Mindfulness can literally be in anything. It’s not just meditating, journaling, and yoga.
Mindfulness is simply the state of mind where we pay attention to our thoughts, emotions, behaviors, and surroundings so we can be more present and overall become happier, peaceful beings.
There’s no reason your can’t practice mindfulness this holiday season with your kids and it is so incredibly important that we keep our mindfulness with us during Christmas time.
You don’t need to pull out all your hair with stress trying to make Christmas morning a miracle for your kids.
Parents, I’m not a parent, I’m just a 16 years old that has other 4 siblings, but tell me if you go through this struggle too.
As much as you love your kids you gotta admit, this is the time of year where your kids get a bad case of the gimmies, blood sugar meltdowns, and unrealistic expectations. Common heard phrases are…
- “I want to buy my friend this!”
- “I’m hope Santa brings me this”
- “Can I have more cookies?”
- “Can we make this?”
- “I don’t really want to eat my dinner” Having seriously eaten way too many cookies and candy canes
- “I want to wrap the presents!”
- “Can we go ice skating and shopping and pick out a tree?”
- “Can we put up the tree now?”
- “I want to put the star on top! She already got to last year so it’s my turn!”
On and on and on. And it’s not their fault, we know, it just that they get a bit too tied up with getting more and more because it’s fun.
But what if we can do all these things with a touch of mindfulness this year? What if it can take the stress down by a TON!
Guess what? It probably will.
(Not being dramatic here)
Let’s keep our mindfulness with us this holiday season
With the state the world is in, there might be less events and more staying in. Don’t worry. These holiday mindfulness activities can all be done close to home or even in your home.
So without further ado here are 11 ways to practice mindfulness this holiday season with your kids.
12 Ways To Practice Mindfulness With Your Kids This Holiday Season
1 | Peppermint Hot Cocoa Meditation 🧘🏽♀️
This one is my favorite and I bet it’ll be your kids favorite too.
Prepare a peppermint hot cocoa for you and your kiddo (psst. I put a great recipe below).
Sit on the floor with your cocoa in hand and set a timer for five minutes.
Focus your attention on your cocoa, you can do this with eyes open or closed. I would recommend eyes closed but this could be a spilling hazard for some kids.
Use these prompts.
- What does your cup feel like? Is it warm? How does it fit in your hand.
- What does your cocoa smell like? Notice every small scent.
- Taking small, slow sips, what does your cocoa taste like? Notice all the flavors in the peppermint, the chocolate, the milk, the whipped cream.
- How does it make you feel? Happy, warm, excited, joyful etc.
Continue noticing these things as you sip your cocoa until the timer goes off. Then talk about what you noticed, how it made you feel, and how you feel different than before .
Peppermint Hot Cocoa Recipe
What you’ll need: Serves 3
- 2 cups of milk of choice (dairy or non dairy)
- 3 oz of Nibble Chocolate Powder {use the code NOMADSWITHAPURPOSE to get 5% off} (or sub with 3 oz. of any chocolate bar)
- 1/8 – 1/4 tsp quality peppermint extract
- Crushed candy cane for topping
- Whipped cream
Directions
- Heat milk in a sauce pan until hot then add in your chocolate powder mix. Whisk vigorously until completely combined.
- Remove from heat and add in your peppermint extract starting with the lesser amount since it can be strong and overpowering and adding more to your liking.
- Pour your cocoa into three glasses and top with whipped cream + crushed peppermint.
2 | Mindful Present Wrapping 🎁
If you have younger children you might want to skip this one.
This holiday mindfulness practice is simple. When present wrapping comes around, do it mindfully. How to mindfully wrap presents with your kids? Here are the prompts to use…
- First off, move slowly
- What can you hear? Notice the sounds of the wrapping paper cutting
- Notice the details of the paper
- What did you think of each present?
- What thoughts are coming up?
- Do you feel bored?
- Notice if you are gettin sloppier with the wrapping
- Are you not focused on what you are doing?
- Why do you think you feel this way?
3 | Make Gratitude Christmas Ornaments 💚
Looking for some more decorations for your tree? Try out this mindfulness practice with your kids!
What you’ll need:
- Clear Ornaments
- Paint
- Sharpies
- String
Paint your ornaments and have your smol bean write one thing they are grateful for on each one. Ask each other why you are grateful for those things. If your child is having trouble thinking of things here are some prompts…
- Who is one person you are grateful for?
- Name one food you are grateful for?
- Is there something that you couldn’t live without that you are grateful for?
- What is one freedom you are grateful for?
- How about something in every day life that you are grateful for?
- What is one thing from nature that you are grateful for?
4 | Christmas Music Dancing 💃🏽
Put on some Christmas music classics and get groovin’. I love this exercise and kids seem to love it too. This one is great for practicing self expression.
Prompts:
- Instruct them to move how they feel their body wants to move and parents, you should get some dancing in too.
- Whatever song comes on, how does your body want to move?
- Why did you want to move that way?
5 | Your Favorite Festive Character 🎭
“Buddy the Elf, what’s your favorite color?” I LOVE this exercise! It helps young children with expressing their thoughts plus it bring awareness to what we love and value.
Simply just ask who your favorite holiday movie character is and talk about why you like them. Here’s some questions you can ask each other.
- Who is your favorite Christmas movie character?
- What do you like about them?
- Would you want to be friends with this person or do you want to be more like this person?
- Do you feel like you are like this person?
- Do you feel like you are really different from this character?
- What are some pretty cool things about yourself?
6 | Plan A Dream Christmas Day ☑
No materialism allowed. Don’t let them say what they want to GET for Christmas. Instead, talk about what you would want to DO on a dream Christmas Day. Write it out in detail. Maybe even get a planner out!
Here are some prompts:
- Where would you want to be when you wake up on your dream Christmas day?
- What would you want to do first when you wake up on Christmas Day?
- Who would you want to be with you?
- What would you have for each breakfast and dinner?
- Are there specific activities you would want to do?
- What would you want the rest of your family to do to make sure hey had an amazing Christmas day too?
Who knows! After this, maybe you one up with a new Christmas Day plan the would make everyone happy together on Christmas Day!
7 | Emotional Awareness Gingerbread Men 🍪
This exercise is great in moderation. Do you normally make sugar cookies or gingerbread men for the holiday season? Great! Then here is an easy to incorporate holiday mindfulness practice you can do with your kids.
Bake some gingerbread men and have them decorate the cookies to match the emotions they are feeling. I.e put a happy face on it if they are happy or a sad face if they feel sad or use a lot of colors if they feel energized or a grayish color if they feel “meh”. You could even make a variety of different colored icings and label them as different emotions i.e yellow is happy, blue is sad, pink is hyper, black is frustrated etc.
Prompts
- How are you feeling right now?
- Is there anything bothering you?
- Tell me more about this cookies design?
8 | Do Some Holly Jolly Breathwork 🌬
To keep your energies up for this holly jolly time of year, do some energizing and fun breathwork to recenter our minds and be festive! Try the exercise below with your kids.
Wave breath:
Before we can do energizing breathwork we need to focus ourselves first.
Tell your child to picture their breath as a wave. And they breathe in, the wave builds up, and as they breathe out, the wave crashes on shore. Let the waves crash three times.
Breath of joy:
After you do wave breath together, instruct your child to stand up, take a deep breathe in, lift their arms over their head, and then swing their arms down, fold over their legs and breathe out their mouth, like they are a skier pushing their poles into the ground. And then repeat, breathing in, standing tall, reaching their arms up. Breathing out and swinging down. Do this three times.
9 | Brain Dump Snowflakes ❄️
Make paper snowflakes together and have them write down all of the thoughts going on in their head on the snowflakes. One thought on each snowflake. Once they’ve written all of their thoughts down on snowflakes, have them gather all of them up and throw them into the air! Tell them to picture all of their thoughts leaving their brain as they throw them.
Some prompts to give them after:
- Which snowflake thoughts were bothering you the most?
- Which thoughts do you think we should get rid of?
- Are there any thoughts you want to talk about?
10 | Noticing Details With Christmas Lights 💡
If you live in a neighborhood that likes to get Christmas-y, go walk to see their Christmas decorations at night with your kiddo! This one is great for younger kids because they will be fascinated by the lights. How this experience is mindful? Easy, ask your little one these questions.
- Which house did you like the decorations on best
- Why?
- What’s one small details you can see on each house we pass?
- Which kind of lights do you like? Ones that are colorful? Ones that blink?
- Do the lights make you feel happy?
- How is this house different than the last one?
11 | Roast chestnuts or s’mores over a campfire 🔥
This one is better for older kids and super fun if you have somewhere to do a campfire.
I have never roasted chestnuts before but I have roasted s’mores many many times over a campfire and let me tell you, this can be a great way to practice mindfulness if done right. It’s also an amazing family experience.
What you’ll need:
- Chestnuts or the following
- Marshmallows
- Graham Crackers
- Chocolate (I recommend getting well sourced dark chocolate {Nibble has some amazing chocolate bars too})
- Optional: get creative and get some chocolate candies like Chocolate Peanut Butter Cups, Peppermint Patties etc.
Before allowing them to roast their s’mores or chestnuts, set a timer for five minutes and sit in silence together, just watching the fire. Once that time is up, transition into roasting s’mores and engage in a mindfulness activity by asking the following questions to connect with your kids during the holidays…
- What can you hear? Notice the sound of the crackling fire and even tiny sounds around them too
- What can you see? Notice how the fire moves, how the marshmallow changes color, the sky above their head.
- What can you smell? Notice the smoky fire scent, the sugar aroma of the chestnut/marshmallow.
- Begin by asking your kids about their sensory experience. What can you feel? Encourage them to notice the cool air around them and the warmth of the flame. Feel the layers of clothes around you and the wind. Perhaps your kiddo has some sticky marshmallow on them; bring attention to it so they can wipe it off.
- What can you taste? Eat the chestnut/s’more as slow as possible. Taste every flavor, every hint of flavor.
12 | Do Christmas Tree Pose🎄
Introduce a festive spin on a classic yoga pose that your kids will love! Have them place one foot on their leg, balancing on the other, and reach their hands above their heads. Challenge them to see how long they can maintain balance in this playful variation.
You can add a spin to this by placing Christmas decorations i.e tinsel, lights, a star topper, on them the longer they stand there.
Prompts to give them during or after this exercise..
- Was it hard to balance?
- How did balancing make you feel?
- Did you feel very focused or calm?
- (If they have siblings) Were you busy thinking about how long everyone else was balancing?
Hope you find some fun this holiday season and keep it mindful!!!
If you end up doing these holiday mindfulness with your kids activities, post it on Instagram and tag me @keepitmindful.kids
And if you REALLY loved this blog, then you should just go check out my Mindfulness For Kids Course (Psst. The first week is free!)
Happy holidays!
Related Blogs:
- How To Teach Mindfulness To Your Kids
- 30 Healthy Habits You Can Do With Your Kids
- 6 Tips For Staying Fit During The Holidays
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