Six New Traditions to Add More Joy, Hope, and Kindness to Your Holiday
Yes, it will be a different kind of holiday, but you also have an opportunity to make this year's celebration one of your family's best by scaling down, embracing new traditions, and connecting more deeply to what you most value. These ideas will add a kick of kindness and hope to your COVID-challenged season --- and help you keep the spirit of the holidays alive despite the compromises we're making to keep one another safe.
Cheers to a better 2021!
– Jenny Friedman, Executive Director
ACTION
1. Get creative for a cause. These art activities can make the world a better place, and the steps are easy: add your artwork to the Linked by Love campaign, share a Star of Hope with an isolated elder, send cards to children who are hospitalized or to a service member, or tie fleece blankets for those in need or warmth.
2. Give a gift that gives. What about a charity gift-card for each of your children? You donate the funds, then your kids choose a cause they want to support. It's a great way for kids to start determining their charitable interests and evaluating charities. After the recipients have been decided, gather the family to have each child explain why they are supporting their particular charity.
3. Get out! We're all rediscovering the outdoors these days, and cold weather is no reason to stop. Bundle up, and make winter your own: go plogging, paint snow, have a winter scavenger hunt, shovel for a neighbor, try snowshoeing, decorate a tree with strings of popcorn for the birds, make ice sculptures, or play on a (likely empty) playground.
4. Lighten things up. The upcoming winter solstice is a time for celebrating light. Use candles at dinner this month (or just for a Dec. 21 solstice feast), gather around an open fire and share intentions for the new year; go for drives (or strolls) to view the neighborhood light displays; read a winter solstice book (try The Shortest Day by Wendy Pfeffer) in the dark with a flashlight; or light lanterns in your yard (you can make your own!) to cheer your neighborhood.
Linked by Love campaign
5. Gifts to motivate kindness. We love presents that are fun and also spread compassion. We've curated an impressive selection of service project kits, cooperative games, big-hearted books, and more at our DGT Shop Kind store.
6. Throw a (FREE!) Festival of Giving holiday party. Our annual Festival of Giving was such a hit, we wove all the awesomeness into a do-it-yourself (virtual) family holiday party. We get you started with a sample agenda, recommended supply list, and step-by-step guidance.
TALK
Ask questions that encourage reflection on your family's holiday traditions.
What's most important to you about the holidays? Why?
What might we do to focus more on giving during the holidays?
What new tradition would you most like to add to our holiday celebration?
What's nice about gift giving? What's hard about it?
If you made a list of what you wanted to give, rather than what you wanted to get, what would be on the list?
What's the best gift you ever received?
BOOKS
Each night (or one night a week) throughout the holidays, gather the family for a small ritual: make popcorn, hot cocoa, or s'mores; light a fire (or candles); and cuddle in blankets while you read (and then talk about) a holiday tale or a big-hearted book from our collection. Picture books are treasures for any age and can be used to start BIG conversations about kindness, gratitude, compassion, and empathy -- values that have traditionally defined the holidays.
INSPIRATION
"Blessed is the season which engages the whole world in a conspiracy of love."
– Hamilton Wright Mabie, American essayist, editor, critic, and lecturer