Help me make this Christmas special for my kids without DH!

[HushAByeBaby]

I've posted a while back in chat... didn't get that much response. I didn't realise that there was a whole topic dedicated to Christmas so hoping to have more luck here.

My husband is in the Forces and will be spending Christmas deployed this year. We live hundreds of miles from family so I've decided to stay put with the kids this year for Xmas. It'll just be me, DD1 (aged 5) and DD2 (aged 2).

Unfortunately I don't drive and so a number of our usual festive traditions are now out the window (longleat safari for example). I'm worrying that Xmas won't feel like Xmas for the kids with just me there.

How can I make Christmas Day one to remember for them? They really deserve a special Xmas this year. They haven't seen their dad in 4 months which has been really tough on them. Please help! Thank you

Decorate the house? Make paper chains, colour in bunting that they can help you make?

If you want decorations that are ready to colour / decorate etc look at the baker Ross website. Lots of good things and not too expensive.

Could you get family pj’s so on Christmas Eve you all put your matching pj’s on but you’ve sent a pair to your DH so he can send a photo of him wearing his too? (He doesn’t have to actually be wearing them right at that minute; as long as he’s put them on the kids won’t know when the photo is taken).

What grottos etc do you have nearby? Have a good google and see what's what local to you. E.g. have you a Dobbies nearby? They do loads of Santa events, as do NT properties (though you may need public transport for these).

You could wander round at night to look at all of he Christmas lights. My two loved that last year at 4 and 3.

Ultimately, it is what you make it. So local trips, festive crafts (The Works has cute little kits quite cheaply), baking etc will make it special to them.

One simple craft is hand print trees. I'm sure that would go down a treat!

Are you able to get the bus or train anywhere? Most towns will have grottos or markets on around Christmas. Decorate a gingerbread house, make salt dough decorations, make mince pies or Christmas cookies. For Christmas day I would make it a pj party day and have party food and treats and lots of Christmas films and music.

Whereabouts do you live (roughly)? Lots of places do lovely Christmas events that are quite easy to get to - last year, for instance, I went to the botanical gardens for a Christmas event.

Perhaps you could have different traditions for when Daddy isn't there?

Simple things will make lovely memories. Before the day -A Christmas DVD and hot chocolate wwith marshmallows. Dress the tree together. Make and ice Xmas biscuits together. Write, decorate and Post letters to Santa.
On the day-
Paper over the doorway with Xmas wrap so they can burst through it to their gifts. Play Xmas songs. Have a treat breakfast like chocolate croissants. If you have any religious inclination then churches have family services. Or just a walk collecting leaves or feeding ducks is nice after the present opening madness. Make things easy on yourself...every supermarket does ready prepped roast with stuffing etc. You'll have a fab time

With their ages being so young, I wouldn't worry about not being able to do 'traditions' as they won't recognise it as such.

What's their favourite meal? I'd sack off the Christmas lunch for something more simple which means you can spend time with them on the day itself.

Where do you live? And are you on base or off base? If on base, there will be lots in the same position or who have been and various social events get organised, particularly for the children. If off base, it will fall more to you to organise things but, if we know the area, we can suggest things.
IME, toddler groups etc tend to shut over Christmas but soft play etc is all open other than Xmas Day and Boxing Day and I could usually find a friend or two with similar aged DC who was in need of a break from family events. With one particular NCT friend (who, now that our DC are 8 & 6 and at separate schools, I don't see much of during the year) we always meet up on the afternoon of Xmas Eve and go to soft play or the park depending on the weather. I've then got another group of friends who meet up the day after Boxing Day and again do something which basically means the children get a chance to run around with friends.
If off base, you may have to be a bit creative in who you meet up with and expect a few invitations to be met with scornful comments along the lines of not being able to imagine spending any time between about Dec 23rd and 1st Jan with anyone other than family but plenty of others are desperate for something to do - especially all of those whose partners are in one of the many areas of work where they will be working on Xmas Day or Boxing Day.

My father was deployed when my sister and i were a year older than each of your dc and neither of us remember a damn thing!

Keep it simple for you - don't burn out. Crafts, making Chistmas biscuits/decorating Christmas fairycakes, the fun of the advent calendar, decorating the tree, carrot mince pie and sherry under the tree, Christmas stories at bedtime. Simple food on Christmas Day.

I now live in a foreign country and cannot get the vast majority of 'traditional' food (that i am used to) so we have something different every year. There are no grottos, no Santa train, we don't do Christmas Eve boxes, xmas bedding or pyjamas - yet our 7yo really live Christmas. He spends quality time with us making, buildung and playing with new toys and singing Lock Stock and Barrell's 'Kidnap the Santy Claws' song from Nightmare Before Christmas - over and over that's Christmas for him.

i know it does feel shit.

Do a xmas eve box i fill mine with games colouring books slippers sweets ,xmas story book to read at night and mickey and minnie teddies the xmas ones that we collect every year.
Xmas day just do your normal thing what u would do if your DH were there but for that extra xmas feel id play xmas music watch xmas movies with them,play games just have fun ,take lots of photos for their daddy and get them after xmas to help u make a xmas photo album for him.x

My eldest has asd and gets easily overwhelmed by too much noise, bustle, crowds and excitement so over the years I’ve just learned to have a lovely slow build up through December. We do lots of craft and cooking activities, read Christmas stories each night, build igloos out of the sofa cushions, feed the garden wildlife and go for nature walks
Some crafts have become firm traditions, like baking stained glass cookies, making a decoration for the Christmas tree, cutting out wonky paper snowflakes for the window.
We got a gift of an Usbourne book with decorations to cut out and we make a few more chains and paper angels each year.
Lots of our decorations are natural, from our garden or nature walks, so the dc are very much involved.
A craft I particularly love is rolling beeswax candles from sheets (Lidl do a kit from time to time). We warm them with a hair drier and roll them up and put them into jam jars and decorate the outside (tear small pieces of coloured tissue and glue on with watery pva/ cut out a black silhouette of houses).
Salt dough decorations are perfect for the ages of your dc. You can find recipes online, and variations for white decorations (use cornflour), or if the youngest doesn’t taste everything cinnamon and applesauce dough. Dry them out for a couple of days before putting them in the oven on low for a few hours to minimize cracking.
A roll of brown paper and a potato stamp makes for bespoke gift wrap add a little pva to the glue so it’s not too flaky. Or let the youngest finger paint in two colours (choose two that mix to make a nice third colour for best results).
Realistically the dc are unlikely to cooperate enthusiastically with every activity or concentrate for any length of time. A lot of these can be split over several days, (make dough/ cut shapes/ paint/ tie ribbons) and you need to be fairly relaxed about mess and not too precious about the final results.
It’s all cheap and cheerful fun, and even though it came about because ds didn’t enjoy pantomimes and concerts and shopping and markets, I now prefer our quiet homey rituals. Hope there’s some ideas that you can use.

That was a bit long!
For Christmas Day itself, after opening the Santa presents, you could have a North Pole breakfast. I don’t know if you’re religious and go to mass, but it has the advantage of getting everyone dressed and outdoors and takes care of a couple of hours. Make dinner, but maybe choose something nice for everyone rather than the traditional dinner. But set the table, light candles etc. If you can hold back a present it can be nice to have something fresh to play with at this stage. And then I think I’d spend the evening in a sofa igloo watching Christmas movies.

I know you say your family are far away, but with children that age I'd go home, I'd find it very lonely tbh (fellow forces' wife) x

Forces family here too. Could you ask some family to come to you, if there's no way you could get to them? My husband is home the week before Christmas this year, but if he were away, I'm sure my parents would be at the door without me even asking! Is that a possibility?

1sttimemama

We had the exact same situation a couple of years ago, my mum was on standby (bless her) to come down if for whatever reason he was delayed, thankfully he wasn't :)

Movie times under a duvet with hot choc in your jammies is usually a good shout.

This year I'll be trying 2 new things: a book advent calender (gunna wrap up his old and some new winter/xmas themed stories and he can unwrap one each eve for bed) and elf on the shelf. Managed to pick up on from the pound store and seen some fun ideas on Pinterest.

Pinterest is great for finding some fun and frugal craft ideas, or print outs, baking ideas. I've stored a lot of ideas for xmas games and things you can do bucket list style for xmas as well which is a lot of the usual kind of stuff- bake cookies, see xmas lights.

We will be doing a candy cane hunt like an Easter egg hunt in the house and pin the carrot on the snowman. Tin can alley kind of stuff by throwing fake snow balls and party cups and also jingle bell toss - kind of like beer pong but just aim to get the bells in the cups lol

Mine are much older now. Almost adults, so I'll offer the benefits of hindsight. Your DC won't remember too much honestly. As long as they are happy in the moment, that's what matters. They'll remember the feeling rather than events and the Christmases will merge together in their minds. Do simple things and just spend time playing with them. I agree it's really hard for you being on your own so if it makes you sad to do the things you'd do when DH is there, then don't do them. Do things your way and it will all be special to them as they are spending it with you.

My dds are those ages. I've bought some plain T-shirts and fabric pens from Amazon and were going to do eachother a Christmas T-shirt this year. We also like painting festive stuff on the windows with glass paints. It looks bizzare and if you're into a matchy-matchy coordinated Christmas then it's probably not for you but we love it.

You could help them make a Christmas scrap book for Daddy when he comes home? Collect things related to whatever you do over Christmas to share with him when he gets home

Is it possible for your DH to take of few what's app videos specifically for Christmas. Just a few seconds of Daddy waving, or Daddy asleep in a Santa hat or Daddy enoying a cup of tea. A coiple of funny ones. My kids were of a similar age as he had to work away and they would say 'What's Daddy doing now?' And I would say 'Let's have a look' and we would click on the video snipets'

If you watch a Christmas film, cartoon. Maybe good to get DH to talk about it as in 'Donald duck is my favourite Christmas cartoon, look out idr the bit when he .......' Type of thing.

Love @KC225 suggestion of getting Daddy to send videos whenever he can between now and Christmas so you can share on Christmas Day and make him part of the day x