Deja Vu? Many families are unable to participate in their original New Year’s Day celebrations due to exposure or being sick. Don’t let that stop you from ringing in the new year -differently. This list is for families who are feeling well enough to engage, but not be in crowds or with others. Clearly, for those who are under the weather, rest is the best medicine.
Select an hour - allow everyone to select an hour or two time block and decide what the family does. The only stipulation is that everyone has to participate. So if your youngest wants to play go fish and your oldest wants to play a video game, so be it.
Random selection - Create a list of activities and pull a new one every hour
Use the family grid below with 12 hours of activities!
Parents often struggle with the decision on how long to allow the kids to stay up. There is no right or wrong answer. Consider your children, plans for the next day, and your needs. If your children are pumpkins without enough sleep but you have nothing to do on Saturday, midnight for them. If you need alone time with your spouse, toasting in the new year with kids at 10 is perfectly acceptable too.
For those with teens, if you are not comfortable with them going out, have that conversation early, allow time to work through disappointments, then create a plan together. While it may take compromise on both ends, it is possible to find an option palatable to all.
Happy New Year!
Eat Lunch Outdoors
Start the festivities off in a different way, maybe a great brunch or start with dessert
Brag a blanket and enjoy lunch in your yard or a nearby park
Declutter challenge
grab a bag for trash, box for donations, and basket for items in the wrong room. Set a timer for 10 minutes and tackle a room.
Set a goal to donate 10-30 (based on the room and your amount of items) items from each room
Year in Review
There are so many options for reviewing your year. Here are a few to browse. You can always create your own if you cannot find one you love.
Once complete, store them with the holiday decorations to pull them out next year.
Card Games
Pictures
Spend an hour going through pictures on your devices eliminating the shots you don't like and printing or uploading the ones you love. You may not finish in an hour, but you'll make a dent in them and recall the memories during the process.
This is a great time to organize pictures as well
Painting
Cooking
Plan the menu together and become the sous chef to your children.
If you have toddlers, be sure to add a dish they can prepare
Puzzles
From one larger puzzle that everyone works on together to multiple smaller puzzles that everyone has to complete there are many ways to personalize this activity.
Jigsaw Planet has an amazing selection of online puzzles
Minute to Win It
50 popular games there are hundreds of games. Find some that you have the supplies for and have fun!
We usually have a prize table for winners. If you can't leave the house, it can include coveted snacks, cash, homemade coupons...
Cookie Decorating
Music Countdown
One option is to play the top 10 songs of the year for each genre
There are several sites with videos for the top 100 songs of the year
Trivia
To Do List
You can create this list seasonally, monthly, by person, or as a family
Each person could share three things they would like to do to create a family list
