HAPPY NEW YEAR! GELUKKIG NIEUWJAAR!
Hope this New Year will be a wonderful, healthy and great year for you and your family!
Whatever you are going to do to celebrate the New Year, I hope it won’t be stressful! Not for you, not for your kids. What are you going to do with your kids for New Year’s Eve? Is it only you and your partner, you and friends or you and your kids and you’re going to bed on time?
Activities to do on New Year’s Eve with Kids.
There are some activities you can do with young kids, with older kids and even some of these activities are fun for all ages. We’re at the time now that the 11-year old doesn’t always agree what our 4-year old wants to do. When will that ever happen anyway?
Here are some fun activities:
- If you don’t want your child to be up till 12 AM, count down in the morning till noon instead. Of course you can do these activities also in the afternoon and wait till it is 12 AM for older kids. Make the day and especially the count down, excited with:
- Little sparklers. Stay close and be sure your child will hold the sparkler away from her and holds it at the end of the stick. You can hold it with her too. Our experience: do it outside if you can. Kids are lower to the ground, so a few sparks flew on our wooden floor and made black marks.
- Bubbly apple or pear juice in fancy glasses and make a TOAST to the New Year.
- Golden and sparkly decorations, like balloons, banners, hats, etc.
- Let the kids color some paper watches, which will tell them how long it is going to be until it is 12. You can find adorable ones to print here!
- An old Year’s Review and New Year’s Resolutions. Here are some forms you can print.
- Watch photo’s from last year. Share memories and stories what you liked about last year. We watch our pictures on the big screen with our iPhones and Apple TV.
Dutch New Years traditions
In the Netherlands, New Year is called “Oud op Nieuw”, which means ‘Old on New”, literally. We’re leaving the Old Year and on to the New Year!!
One of the traditions is, to let the Christmas trees stay till Three Kings Day (January 6th). In some towns in the Netherlands they burn the Christmas trees after that day. They are called New Years Fires.
And did you know why there are fireworks (and ringing of the church bells)? This is to scare away demons and ghosts of the deceased. But then it was important to appease the spirits and give offers. After the rituals, people ate and drank the offers. (source)
Typical Dutch dishes around this times are: “Oliebollen”, “wafels” and “kerst stollen”.
In the Netherlands, but also in the US, you wish one-another all the best for the New Year. People sent cards (mail or email).
In the first week of the New Year, people organize “Nieuwjaars Borrels” (small gatherings to wish everyone, family or employees, a Happy New Year).
In the last few years, people jump into icy cold water, like the “Noordzee” as a new tradition to ring in the New Year. Sometimes without bathing suits, or dressed up in all kinds of fun outfits……brrrr, not me, thank you! I bet they will be READY to take on a NEW year!
New Years at our home.
When we were little, my brother and I didn’t stay up till 12 AM, but we went to bed at our normal bed times and my parents woke us up a little before midnight. We were allowed to have some snacks, dress up warmly and stand on our balcony to watch the fire works in our town. After about 20 minutes all the fireworks were done and we would go inside (or we stayed inside if it was too cold outside, and watched the fireworks from behind the windows). Sometimes my parents were watching a concert on TV or a stand-up comedian who was chosen that year to review the year.
When I was older, we went to themed New Years Parties…until the early morning!
New Year in the US
Here in Iowa we haven’t done much with our children when they were small, because there are no fireworks where we live on New Years Eve. The first time I celebrated New Year’s Eve in our town, I was in total shock. NO FIREWORKS???? Even though the bigger cities do have fireworks, like Chicago. My husband and I went to a party and concert with the B52’s in 2003. We watched the fireworks from The Pier in the icy cold night!
Now the kids are bigger and we can do some fun activities this year. We’ll let them choose what they’d like to do:
- We can do Board Games. We like these games: Headbandz, Busytown, Cat in the Hat game en for the older kids: Scrabble and RummiKub or Apples to Apples.
- At some point I went all out on this one. Where did I get so much time to do this? I loved making it, though! It is like digital scrap booking! A Power Point presentation of the best pictures and events we did as a family that year! The comments are great and stories are being told all over again: “Oh, yes, remember….!” or “Wow, was that THIS year?”
- Looking at the different count downs on television in Sydney, Hong Kong, Europe, New York etc. This is another thing we do every year. Amazing fireworks!
- Party grilling!!!! (See ideas below)
- And THEN…… the parents are going out to party!
What to eat on New Year’s Eve with Kids.
It is party time! Need something fun for the whole family? We did our “make-your-on-pizza”-party for a few years, but now the kids are bigger, so time for a change! This year we’re setting up a party grill.
We used to do this in the Netherlands, especially on special days like this. Before we had a party grill, we had a fondue set. My mom made vegetable or chicken broth. This was put in the fondue pot. We poked pieces of chicken or other meat onto skewers and let it boil in the broth. With that we had bread, sauces, salads and drinks. Now we still use a fondue pot, but mainly for chocolate fondue on Valentines Day.
Later we upgraded the fondue set to a party grill or Raclette set. This was so much fun! We were grilling and cooking ourselves! Under supervision of course! We made pancakes and omelettes, we grilled vegetables, meat, chicken and fish in our own little pans. So adorable! My favorite when I was little, was a pineapple slice, topped with small Dutch shrimp, grilled with cheese. Oh, my, sooo good! Here are things to use for a Raclette Party or Party Grill with kids:
- butter or oil
- seasoning, salt, pepper
- chicken breast, cut into small pieces, optional marinated chicken pieces
- bacon, we used veggie bacon
- shrimp or other small pieces of fish
- sausages, we used veggie sausages
- bell peppers, cut into small pieces
- onions, cut into small pieces
- mushrooms, cut into small pieces
- eggs, make them into omelets with onion, bell peppers and mushrooms topped with shredded cheese.
- pancakes
- edamame (Japanese Soy beans)
- zucchini
- brie and other shredded cheeses
- pre-boiled potatoes, cut into slices or cubes
Are there any fun things YOU do or eat on New Year’s Eve with your kids? I would love to know…
Hello everyone,
Welcome to my Crafty Dutch Girl blog! Grab a cup of “koffie” and browse through fun blog posts about our Dutch family expat life in the USA, Dutch history, Dutch recipes, Dutch things to do in the USA and all kinds of crafts and activities. Don’t forget to connect with me for new ideas! “Groetjes en tot ziens”.