Plans for December

With December only a few days away, I feel I ought to share what our plans are for the month.  I am going to call ours a 'December plan' rather than an Advent plan because we are not Christians, so I don't feel right about using the term 'advent' when we don't actually celebrate the days leading up to Christmas Day in a religious way.

In our own secular way, we honour Christmas Day as a major festival with our own family traditions, which include setting aside time each December to do something special.  To me, the significance of Christmas Day to the English side of our family is on par with that of Chinese New Year to the Chinese side of the family.

Since we are not calling our December activities 'advent' activities anymore, I feel a sense of relief that I don't have to come up with 24 different activities for us to complete in order to earn our place at the Christmas table.  I have come up with fewer than 24 activities because I would like to spend some time this year to observe the Dongzhi Festival (冬至), which is another important Chinese festival that takes place near Christmas Day.

Below are our Christmas-related activities for December, in no particular order:

• make Christmas cards
• make lanterns
• watch Christmas-related movies
• listen to Christmas music
• see Christmas lights
• learn to sing three Christmas carols
• learn to recite one Christmas poem
• decorate the house
• decorate the tree
• watch a Christmas-related documentary
• go for two nature walks
• make mince pies
• read Christmas-related stories
• draw Christmas-related drawings

I aim to be more diligent with blogging in December, so having a planned list of activities for the month will give me a good reason to do so.