Fun Holiday Activities for Young Adults and Families

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I’m always looking for ways to keep the magic of Christmas alive now that our kids are young adults. Our youngest is in college, and our oldest lives about 3 hours away, so I try to make the most of our time when we’re all together as a family. I heard a quote a few years ago, and since then it has become something that I have become intentional about. The quote is, “Relationships are built on shared experiences.” I think this quote applies to many types of relationships, but isn’t it beautiful to think of in the context of families?

Relationships are built on shared experiences.

Where can we go together? What foods can we taste together? What games can we play together? How can we have FUN together? ‘Shared experiences’ have one thing in common, time spent together. Even when the quantity of time isn’t great, like when we are separated by distance, we can be intentional about the quality of the time spent together.

This brings me to my point of intentionally planning experiences this holiday season with our 20-something year olds and their significant others. My husband, Ken, and I are planning several things, but the one I want to share today is the white elephant advent calendar exchange we are planning for Thanksgiving. I use the term ‘white elephant’ loosely because we are really only using the rules of the game in this situation. We’re going to buy and wrap advent calendars to play a gift exchange with. Since our kids are in their young 20s, and therefore on a budget, Ken and I are going to buy all of the advent calendars. If we continue this game in years to come, we’ll up the fun-factor by asking everyone to contribute a wrapped one of their own.

Thanksgiving is the perfect time to play this game, because the advent calendars are needed before December 1st. We’re going to choose calendars that anyone would enjoy, regardless of who ends up with it. It will really be fun to see which ones are the favorites.

For now, I have rounded up sixteen of this year’s advent calendars that I think are the best. This list includes picks for young children, teens, women, and men. There are a couple of splurges, but most of them are priced $20-$25. Many of them have coupons to click before checkout, and several of them are reusable. I’m not going to share which ones off of this list that I’m buying in case one of our kids happens to read this article (unlikely), but please do come back and leave a comment if there’s one from the list that your family particularly enjoys.

You can click the photo above to find all 16 of these advent calendars in my LTK shop, or you can click the name below to go directly to the advent calendar’s website.

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Countdown to Christmas this year‘s best advent calendars

Countdown to Christmas: This Year’s Best Advent Calendars

It’s November 1st, and if you haven’t started planning out your fun Christmas activities, today is a great day to start. One of our family’s favorite traditions is an advent calendar. They’ve changed over the years as our kids have grown. Some years I put together the little advent goodies to open each day, but on other years I felt like it was much easier to buy one that was ready-made. Today I am sharing a dozen of the best advent calendars you can find this year.

Below you can find a description of each calendar. You can either click on the name of the calendar to be taken directly to the retailer, or you can click on the photo below to be taken to my LTK shop. Did I miss a really great advent calendar that you’d recommend? Be sure to let me know in the comments.

This year‘s best advent calendars

Playmobil was the very first advent calendar our kids did! Pro tip: This is actually a reusable advent calendar. Open the boxes carefully and save them to use again year after year. Click HERE for the Playmobil advent calendar.

Pukka Tea makes a wonderful advent calendar. My daughter and I did this together one year, and it is one of her favorite memories. Pukka tea is organic and sustainably sourced. Click HERE for the Pukka Tea advent calendar.

Dog Treat advent calendar is always fun to do at least one year if you have a furry friend. Our family had a ton of fun spoiling our pups with these delicious treats each day. We even made them pose with a Santa hat to get a cute photo opening their box each day. Click HERE for the dog treat advent calendar.

Rituals bath, body, and beauty advent calendar is really exciting for the makeup fan in your house. It even comes with little string lights to decorate the tree. Click HERE for the Rituals advent calendar.

Sugarfina advent calendar is perfect for the person who wants a little sweet treat each day. Each drawer is filled with FOUR pieces of candy! Click HERE for the Sugarfina advent calendar.

Harry & David Deluxe Advent Calendar is highly rated. These are some of the most decadent truffles you can taste. Click HERE for the Harry & David advent calendar.

This Wooden Advent Calendar is perfect for busy, small hands. No worries if they want to add the ornaments over and over again. With 5-star reviews from parents who love it, you can’t go wrong with it for small children. Click HERE for the wooden advent calendar.

Lego Advent Calendars are a hit with kids and adults who are kids-at-heart! Our college aged son picked this out for himself this year; he remembers having a lot of fun doing a similar one as a kid. Click HERE for the Lego Advent Calendar.

Coffee Advent Calendars are perfect for the coffee lover. They’re going to drink a cup each morning, so why not make it fun and festive? We love this one for the Keurig owner. Click HERE for the coffee advent calendar.

I am especially excited about this Bon Mamman advent calendar. I love their French jams and honey. For the price, I think this is one is a gem. It has sold out on a few websites, but I found one that still has it in stock. Click HERE for the Bon Mamman advent calendar.

Ornament advent calendars can help you get into the holiday spirit each day. At $125, this is one of the pricier advent calendars on the list this year, but I think these little glass ornaments are beautiful. Pro tip: save the calendar to store the ornaments in for next year. Click HERE for the ornament advent calendar.

The Adventure Challenge advent calendar is one of the more affordable calendars on the list this year. It is also one of my favorite finds! This advent calendar has a little scratch off box each day with an activity to do together with your loved ones. The website says, “this holiday edition was created to help build new holiday traditions, find new ways to connect during a busy season, and enjoy time with loved ones.” Love it! Click HERE for the adventure challenge advent calendar.

I’d love to know which ones your family did this year! Follow me on Facebook to share a photo of your advent calendar. You can also find me on Instagram and LTK, just search “BelleAntiquarian.”

Until next time!

Abby

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3, 2, 1…….CHRISTMAS!!!

I remember being excited beyond belief that Christmas was coming. So excited that every waking thought was consumed with the fantasy of opening presents on Christmas morning. Sadly, though, I was a sneaker and a peeker. Being the youngest of four, the belief in the magic of Santa and the North Pole didn’t stick around too long before I caught onto older brother and sister talking about where everything might be hidden. So we looked, dug, and scoured until we found the “magic” of Christmas, which happened to be in a Toys R Us bag at the back of Mom’s closet. I look back and wonder, “Didn’t Mom and Dad ever think it was strange that they never got the right reaction?” I mean, the fake surprised looks or lack of surprise on all four of our faces must’ve given something away.

I’m trying to create some Christmas magic of my own now that I’m all grown up (boo!) with kids who are just as consumed with the thought Christmas morning, slightly out of their reach. There are two things I’m big on at Christmas all year long: Memory making and kindness. I want to give my kids rich, meaningful memories that will carry them through life. And I want to impress upon them the utmost important of kindness to every human being.

One way I combine kindness and family at Christmas is through our advent calendar. Every year it has evolved a little bit more, and next year it will probably change a little bit again. I have been inspired in the past by the blog Lil Light O’ Mine which encourages a campaign of random acts of Christmas kindness during the holiday season called Light ‘Em Up. Using this blog as a basis for my inspiration, last year I created an advent calendar with a different random act of kindness activity each day. This year I have decided to change it up a little bit and integrate my desire to intentionally create Christmas memories within our family. So this year I have divided our advent activities, with half being random acts of kindness and half being family activities. For our family, it’s best for us to find a balance in everything we do, which creates peace and also those pleasant memories I’m after for my kids.

This year I made a new calendar to use. Starting with some (free!) book pockets that my daughter’s teacher gave me when she was going through one of her storage closets, I spray painted them with Krylon chalkboard paint. Krylon 227037 Low Odor Clear Finish Aerosol Spray-Gloss-11 Ounces (Google Affiliate Ad)

I only sprayed the front of the pockets. The backs have a backing that you can peel off and use to stick them onto something. I wanted to leave the peeling on in case I decided to use them for something different in the future. After they were dry, I hot glued them onto some black and white baker’s twine.

Next I took an old window frame and turned it into the backdrop for my advent calendar. You can get one from my Etsy (click here) shop and use it for something else when it’s not being used as an advent calendar. (More on these in another upcoming post.)

Finally, I created some “tags” to fit inside of our advent pockets. I printed some labels that either listed a family activity or “Random Act of Christmas Kindness” on them. Of course, these needed some baker’s twine, too. Red, this time.

Hopefully no “sneakers” or “peekers” will be looking ahead to see what’s coming ahead in our advent calendar…


The magic of Santa and the North Pole, along with sweet baby Jesus is strong at our house. Don’t you go looking in the back of my closet for any Toys R Us bags!
Happy Ho Ho Ho to you!
XOXO,
Abby

P.S.
Here’s a list of what’s in our calendar:
(12) cards read: Random Act of Christmas Kindness
Make Christmas Cookies
Drive Around After Dark (And Look at Christmas Lights)
Outdoor Fire with S’mores
Decorate a Gingerbread House
Hot Chocolate Bar (With All the Fixings)
Make Christmas Ornaments
Nights of Lights (at Lake Lanier)
Christmas Movies (with Popcorn and Sodas)
Find the Pickle on the Tree
Call a Friend (Invite them to a Holiday Themed Sleepover)
Email from Santa is Waiting for You
Surprise! You’ll have to wait and see until we get there! //assets.pinterest.com/js/pinit.js

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