Have Yourself A Connected Little Christmas
The tides have recently changed once again due to covid and many are preparing to spend the holidays solo without friends and family. It can be a daunting thought if it’s an experience you haven’t lived through yet. Jessica, owner of Market House, made the move with her husband and kids from Manitoba to Alberta back in 2012, and had to learn new ways to stay connected to family from a distance during the holidays. It just wasn’t feasible to travel back and forth every time a special occasion rolled around. With another brother and his family also living in Vancouver, her whole family collectively had to get creative with ideas of how to make holidays feel connected still with each other and make some memories a different way.
Recently Jessica approached her mom (Sherri) back in Manitoba to help her brainstorm this list to help friends, siblings, parents, grandparents, etc. not feel disconnected from each other during the holidays and maybe start some new traditions in the process. These are a collection of ideas we have both done or are planning to do, and we hope it helps connect you too!
Games Night
Find a game you all have and play over zoom or facetime.
Games that work great for this:
Battleship
Wanna Bet? - Enjoy a challenge and seeing what random talents your friends have (or don’t have)? This game is a memory-maker and can be purchased online from most game stores for curb-side pickup.
Uno
What Do You Meme (the Family edition is great for including the kiddos!)
Charades - a great word generator for this game can be found HERE
Pictionary - This game works well using the whiteboard feature in zoom and putting it on screen share
Code Names - You can even play an online version with a group over zoom screen share HERE
Houseparty - this is an app downloaded to your phone (can also be played on desktop on certain operating systems) much like facetime to play games in real-time with friends. Check it out HERE
Jackbox - We love Jackbox (and also love that there are now parental controls on the games so you can make it appropriate for the whole family to play) This is another game you’ll need to screen share for and it DOES cost a little to download the first time, but it’s worth it! Click HERE for more info.
What Did You Say? - pick a theme (Disney movie titles, songs of the 90’s, etc) or words or phrases at random, and then take turns muting your video and say your word or phrase until participants guess correctly what you said (or have no idea and give up all together!)
Things In A Box - Grab a random object in your home and hide it from the camera and then take turns using vague descriptive terms for it until the object is guessed. This game tends to get off track quickly in the most hilarious ways!
Escape Rooms
Who’s to say that you can’t have an escape room experience without being in the same room at the same time? You can have all the fun of an escape outing with friends or family without even leaving your home now!
Purchasing the same copy of an EXIT or UNLOCK game and running through it together online would be a great challenge, or you can try some of our favourite online escape rooms and screen share them over zoom!
Here are a few of our favourites:
Alone Together - This two player (or 2 team) online escape room is completely free and is a real-time online game that utilizes both screens at the same time so team 1 and team 2 need to work collectively to solve puzzles and riddles to get through the game.
Mr. X - I LOVED this escape game that takes you all over the internet to solve! We played this one in a group over zoom with about 8 individuals and it worked so well! This one is a bit of a longer commitment, taking us just over an hour to solve and a lot of brain power! There are also add-on games to this series through the same company once you’ve completed Mr. X that are available for a minimal donation. Click HERE to start!
365Escape - If you love more puzzle-driven escape rooms - get online on zoom screen share to play collaboratively or on speaker/facetime with a friend on your phone to play competitively and both pick one of the HUNDREDS of online escape games from 365Escape - completely free, short time frame games to give your brain a bit of a boost to break up your day! Click HERE to go to the website!
Keep Talking And Nobody Explodes - Not entirely an escape game, but still along the lines of the same collaborative effort with the group, this game requires at least 1 individual to purchase the game for around $15CDN and the rest of the player only need to download or print off the bomb manual to play the game. Quick rounds in the game make this a fast paced, enjoyable time for every one! Click HERE for more info.
Craft Time
Send list of supplies needed to each family or individual. Make it simple so shopping isn't required.
Tip - Have an adult present to supervise on the other end if playing with kids. I've (Sherri) had a grandchild slopping paint everywhere without supervision. She also decided half way through that she wanted to do pipe cleaner animals instead and ditched the craft. Go with the flow! Not much you can do about it and the aim is to spend time with them, not get the craft done!
PlayDoh Dates
Sherri bought packages of playdoh online on Black Friday and sent each family a box in the mail, they then set up dates to make Christmasy things out of playdoh over zoom. Try to give each child a chance to bring an idea of what to make. Examples: a Christmas tree with decorations, Santa, snowman, angel, fireplace with stockings, ornaments etc. It’s fun to see where their imaginations end up!
Robert Munsch Night
The local Winnipeg theatre company puts on a Robert Munsch Milk and Cookies theatre night every year for families and put on a live production of some beloved Munsch classics. This is a Christmas tradition for our extended family to go to the theatre in our pj's and enjoy the memories we make there together. Sadly, we can't do that this year, so we are doing a virtual show of our own thanks to the ingenuity of our 12 year old niece! Each family has chosen a Robert Munsch book and will be acting it out for the other families online (or prerecord it and share it with the group) and have milk and cookies together! You can pick your favourite kid’s stories, or even a movie and recreate it with your family - or just make this a story reading if acting isn’t your style!
Have Yourself A Zoom-y Little Christmas Gathering
Light the candles, pass the Zoom link, put on the Kenny G. music (is that not everyone’s soundtrack to Christmas??) and everyone makes a dessert to eat together. Our traditional Christmas dessert in our family is a strawberry jello parfait. Afterward, we will take turns opening gifts together (nothing beats seeing those reactions and smiles, right?!). You could even have a moment to read the Christmas story as a family, pray over each other and the coming year, or share memories you are grateful for!
Sherri bought four of her younger granddaughters the same water bottles for Christmas this year that can be decorated with markers and stickers. The plan is for all the cousins to get together via Zoom and decorate their water bottles together! She’s also had a cookie decorating date with one of her grandkids leading up to Christmas holidays. Her granddaughter had cookies and icing and sprinkles on her end and she had the same. We just decorated together and ate cookies - so much fun!
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We know how our hearts long to be with each other, to hug each other, to talk without a screen between us. Above all the frustrations and sadness this year has held, we hope you feel pure joy in the little moments to remind you that it won’t always be this way. We hope you make memories that will overshadow loneliness, and focus on what you CAN do instead of what you can’t.
