The December holidays are one of my favorite times. However, it can also be stressful for global families-juggling travel, meeting relatives and friends, and balancing different customs and traditions. How can you keep calm and ensure you and your kids make the most of your holiday experience? My quick tips: embrace your family’s unique customs, maintain routines, embrace focus on sharing experiences over buying gifts, don’t overdo it, and take time to express gratitude.
1. Embrace your family’s unique customs
What are your holiday traditions? For our German Indian American family in the Netherlands, the holidays are a hodgepodge of accumulated traditions. We take out the German miniature nativity figurines, advent wreaths and calendars. My husband toils over the creation of homemade mulled wine and lebkuchen cookies. This is alongside my favored American traditions of sending a holiday card and having an open house for neighbors. We have also adopted the local Dutch customs of welcoming Sinterklaas, ice-skating, and savoring ollie bollen (traditional donuts), and often top it off by eating spicy hot south Indian food. It’s a very exciting and sometimes crazy mix, but one that I know our kids look forward to every year. Creating these traditions are an important part of upholding your family’s multiculturalism and building your child or teen’s sense of identity and belonging.
2. Maintain routines
During the holidays, kids may be off schedule, travelling through time zones, staying up late, eating lots of sweets and on screens more than usual. Of course, doing this from time to time is fine, but certainly can affect mood and energy levels. If possible, try to stick to your usual routines including sleep time. Try putting a few family activities on the calendar so everyone can plan ahead but avoid overscheduling. Also, set modified limits on screen time. Finally, ensure everyone get ample time every day to let off steam by getting outdoors or exercising. If your child or teen is struggling to sleep because of jet lag or late nights, try this sleep meditation video by pediatrician Dr Steve Silvestro or these meditation apps.
3. Focus on sharing experiences over buying gifts
Instead of getting focused on buying more material goods, what can we do that involves giving our time, creating a homemade gift, or volunteering? A friend plans a small individualized trip with each of her four kids as their holiday gift. The emphasis is spending quality time together. Every year my sister-in-law sends us a lovely package made of homemade decorated cookies, a handmade card, and other personal items created by the family (candles, ornaments, bookmarks, clothing). Although I am not as organized to do this myself for our family, I like the focus on creativity rather than materialism. We now encourage our kids to create gifts rather than buy them. Last year, my 11 years-old son Nick gave my husband a series of coupons which involved spending time together. This holiday, he is busy at work making his own handmade games for the family.
4. Don’t overdo it
We often put a lot of pressure on ourselves to make sure things are perfect-meals, gifts, gatherings, decorations, and so on. Often, it can take away from the joy of gatherings and celebrating. Minimizing stress by keeping things simple can put the focus back on what’s most important, sharing quality time and reflecting on the special messages of peace and joy. Don’t forget to take time as a parent to relax and recharge through exercise, mediation or prayer, yoga, keeping a journal, and getting enough sleep.
5. Take time to say thanks
I recently listened to a podcast about a man who started a gratitude project and decided to thank one person in his life every day (via email, letter, or phone) for a year. I love this concept and do feel that being grateful is so important. In addition to expressing gratitude, it is important to teach our teens to give back during the holidays. As illustrated by this recent study, when you carve out time to show kids the importance of giving back, they prioritize generosity in their own lives. They also will model this for their kids. As we know from my previous blog, kids who are kind end up being more successful in work and personal relationships.
The holidays can be challenging for some teens and their families. Whether it is having to celebrate apart from family because of distances, spending time with folks that may be difficult, accommodating multiple needs, or mourning the loss of special person. If the holidays, are very stressful for you or your teen, it may be time to chat with a friend, counselor or health provider.
Finally, what are you doing to minimize stress and make the most of your holidays? Would love to hear from you.