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Home » Single Mom Life » Family Christmas Traditions to Start for $5 or Less

Family Christmas Traditions to Start for $5 or Less

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Fun family Christmas traditions to start even teenagers will love. There are ideas to make keepsake Christmas ornaments. These traditions are simple and meaningful activities for the night before Christmas and Christmas day.

Are you looking for frugal Christmas family activities? Get this list of fun cheap family Christmas traditions to start.

If you are a single mom there are probably times when your budget is tight. In our private Facebook group, Empowered Single Mom Tribe we started sharing ideas on how to make Christmas special without spending a lot of money.

 

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That got me thinking about all the possibilities of how to make holidays special without spending money.

The key here is to focus on spending time together and making happy family memories.

Meaningful Cheap Family Christmas Traditions to Start

  1. Watch a holiday parade (ours is the Friday after Thanksgiving)
  2. Drive around and look at the holiday lights
  3. Make looking at lights even more fun with a Christmas lights scavenger hunt free printable
  4. Free holiday concerts malls, high schools, and colleges are all great places to attend free concerts. Tuba Christmas is one of my favorite Christmas concerts. I had never heard of it until one of my sons performed in it.
  5. Baking cookies-watch for sales on flour, butter, and sugar for shortbread or snowballs.
  6. Play family games. This is still my favorite family tradition.
  7. Build a snow family, if you have snow
  8. Make teddy bear bread
  9. Make salt dough ornaments
  10. Use Christmas coupons for gifts
  11. Binge watch Christmas movies or watch 2 or 3 a week starting Thanksgiving weekend.
  12. Christmas Eve candlelight service at church
  13. Go Christmas caroling at a local nursing home
  14. Sing Christmas carols at home
  15. Make a Christmas playlist
  16. Let the kids shop for gifts at a second-hand store or dollar store
  17. Make ornaments with puzzle pieces. It seems like we always have puzzles missing pieces or you can buy used puzzles on the cheap at second-hand stores. Two of my most treasured ornaments are wreaths made of cast-off puzzle pieces, spray painted green with the boys’ kindergarten pictures in them. I found more puzzle piece ornament inspiration here. I have also seen snowflake puzzle ornaments.
  18. Decorate the tree. If you don’t have money for ornament there are many options to make ornaments. Many of our ornaments have a story behind them. I have several homemade ornaments that were given to me as a gift and I tell the story of the person who gave it as I put the ornaments up.
  19. Make your own ornaments with cookie cutters. Applesauce cinnamon ornaments make the house smell fantastic. You can decorate them or leave them plain as I do. They will usually last for 2-3 years.
  20. String popcorn and cranberries for an old-fashioned Christmas feel.
  21. Pizza shaped like a Christmas tree.
  22. Christmas breakfast pancakes shaped like Rudolph or Santa. More Christmas breakfast inspiration here.
  23. Make snow angels
  24. Sledding
  25. Walk around the neighborhood looking for signs of Christmas
  26. Set up a scavenger hunt to find the gifts or at least one of them. Wrap the first clue and put it under the tree.
  27. Do a family Christmas play useing the dress-up box for costumes
  28. Christmas charades
  29. Dinner by candlelight
  30. Fancy hot chocolate with whipped cream and Christmas sprinkles
  31. Christmas bond fire (if you have a fire pit)
  32. Make homemade caramel corn
  33. Make melted snowman bark
  34. Create homemade Christmas cards
  35. Use copies of pictures when the kids were younger for gift tags
  36. Read Christmas books together get them from the library
  37. Volunteer at a community Christmas meal
  38. Christmas Pictionary
  39. Assign each family member to research Christmas traditions from another country and share what you find out with each other.
  40. Make some of your gifts under $5
  41. Hot Cocoa Bar
  42. Popcorn Bar for family movie or family game night

What are some of your cheap family Christmas traditions that cost less than $5?

Related: How to Have a Magical Christmas with a Tight Budget

Easy, Cheap DIY Christmas Decorations to Make at the Last Minute

Frugal Gifts People Actually Want to Receive

How to Make Ends Meet a Single Mom’s Ultimate Guide 

Family Christmas Eve Pajamas for Your Christmas Morning Photo Shoot

Get your Christmas Scavenger Hunt Printable Here
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Hi, I’m Tamara the creator of Empowered Single Moms, a single mom, a Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LICSW) and the author of Thriving a Single Mom’s Guide to a Happy, Positive Life and Thriving a Single Mom Journal. I have a solo private psychotherapy practice where I treat anxiety, depression, and relationship issues.

As a member of the Empowered Single Moms community, I believe you can stop carrying the weight of the world alone and build a life you love. Join my mailing list and get 5 Keys to Single Mom Success.

 

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Filed Under: Single Mom Life Tagged With: Christmas, Frugal Living

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Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. CJ

    November 26, 2018 at 3:33 pm

    I love this list – as a single mom with older kids, we have found that experiences are more important than things. We love having game nights and cooking together.

    Reply
  2. Haralee

    November 26, 2018 at 4:24 pm

    Great activity ideas! I love looking at lights and the bigger more tacky displays the better! I look online when there is a Santa Pub crawl. It just tickles me to see a few Santa’s walking around downtown!

    Reply
    • empowerd single moms

      November 27, 2018 at 2:27 am

      Haralee, a Santa Pub crawl sounds really fun.

      Reply

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