2: Design and make your own Christmas cards. Get the children to help. Don’t miss the last post. Your local post office will have a list of the last dates you can post to various countries.

3: Get in the Christmas spirit with a Christmas story (or two!). Reading is a wonderful activity for families to spend some quality time together. 

4: Decorate a Christmas tree and put some lights up outside to get you and your neighbours in the festive mood. Why not have a go at making a modern holiday wreath. Kits are available from our partner À Nos Racines and are priced at just 29 Euros + delivery or enter our competition to win a kit.

5: Listen to some Christmas Carols. It fills the house with the joy of Christmas and gets everyone in the festive spirit. 

6: Contact a local charity and ask what’s on their wish list for the holidays. This year Enfants d’Azur magazine is supporting The Lenval Foundation, Paediatric hospital in Nice.

7: Have a baking day. Make your Christmas cake, mince pies, and “figgy pudding”. One of my favorite activities is to bake and decorate special cookies to hang on the tree. 

8: Make some Christmas crackers. You will be surprised how easy they are to make using empty toilet rolls and festive wrapping paper! Kids can write jokes on bits of paper and craft crowns to go inside. 

9: Once the restrictions are lifted, take the children to see the Père Noël. He can often be found at a ‘Christmas Market’ but this year I wouldn’t be surprised if he were bookable as a zoom call. 

10: Finally, on Christmas Eve it is traditional to put some food out on the fireplace for Santa and the reindeer. In our family, we put a small glass of sherry and a mince pie for him and a small bowl of reindeer food made up of rolled oats, sugar, edible glitter, and cake sprinkles. 

We hope you like our ideas, if you have some fun ideas of your own or personal family traditions for Christmas, please do not hesitate to share them on our Facebook group @Côted’AzurMumsandDads06