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Are you looking for some fresh ideas for your children’s ministry this Christmas? Wouldn’t it be great to host a children’s ministry Christmas party in your small church that would be easy to prepare, plan, and produce, but one that would make a lasting impact on attendees? We at the Small Church Ministry are here to help! We hope you enjoy these 8 fun and creative children’s ministry Christmas party ideas.
It’s A Great Time For A Christmas Celebration
Christmas is a season for hospitality and gathering, especially as we celebrate the gift of Jesus’ coming to earth to offer us love and eternal life! It’s also a season when non-church goers are open to attending special events and activities for their kids and their entire family. As small churches, we can use this season to reach out to our communities, connect, and build relationships with these families as we invite kids in to participate in our fun Christmas parties!
Of course, we know that having special activities like these is a great way to show the children in our ministry how much they are valued and seen; to let them know they are a vital part of our small church family.
The ideas that we are giving you are able to be for a small group of kids or a larger group as well. They are adaptable to different-sized spaces and most are easy to gather materials for and easy to host. Get parents and older folks to join in the parties as hosts and volunteers, making it a true Christmas-time intergenerational celebration. So, who’s ready to have some fun?
8 Fun And Easy Children’s Ministry Christmas Party Ideas
1. A Sharing Caring Christmas Celebration
This party has a dual purpose, not only celebrating the joy of the Christmas season with each other, but also modeling the example of caring for others with the children. Children will have the opportunity to bring items in to stuff a stocking to bless other children.
Try finding a place in your community where you can donate these stockings, i.e., a foster children’s program, a children’s hospital, partnering with the local Dept. of Children’s services, or another charity you might have near you.
Decor:
Use traditional and fun Christmas colors and decor, but use Christmas stockings as a focal point. You can make large ones out of poster board to hang on the wall, make a clothesline of mini stockings to use as a garland, etc.
Activities:
- Fun Game: Identify What’s In The Stocking. Take 5 different stockings, put a number on each one, then place a Christmas-related item in each. Fold over the top and pin it shut. Pass the stockings out to guests. Then, try to guess what’s in each stocking by feeling it. Write answers on paper. Non-writers can be paired with a teen helper or senior guest.
- Suggestions for stocking items: pinecone, candy cane, jingle bell, ornament, Christmas light bulb, etc.
- Cool Craft: Kids can decorate plain stockings to be stuffed. Provide stick-on gems, squeeze craft paints, paint markers, and glitter, if you’re brave!
- Yummy Snack: You can decorate sugar cookies cut in the shape of a stocking. Provide icing, sprinkles, and mini candies. Decorate one to eat and one to take home.
- The highlight of the party is the children stuffing the stockings to give away. What a great opportunity to share the reason we are inspired to show love at Christmas, which is because of the love that Jesus showed to us.
- For simple party favors, provide guests with a mini stocking with Christmas candies and a card inviting children and families back to Christmas services at your church. This is a high note to end the party on and shows love to both children and families.
2. You’re Invited To A Marshmallow World Holiday Party!
Using a line from an old song is the inspiration for this fun and unique Christmas party. The song likens a snowy Christmas scene to that of marshmallow fluff. Even if you don’t live in a snowy area or celebrate the holidays during winter, this party theme can be tons of fun for your small church kids. Pair this with a devotional about Jesus washing our sins away and becoming white as snow.
Decor:
Use polyfill stuffing to make snow piles, white fun foam cut out in marshmallow shapes with cute faces, a garland of white pom pom balls, or a s’mores garland can be festive combined with tinsel garland! Use an inexpensive bed pillow and add a strip of tan fun foam or felt on the top and bottom of the pillow. Paint on a stripe to look like chocolate, add a face, and you have a giant s’more! White tablecloths and jars of mini and/or large marshmallows all add to the fun, festive decor.
Activities:
- Fun Game: Have a contest for guessing the number of mini marshmallows in the jar. The winner takes home the jar, plus a gift bag with a box of rice cereal and red holiday sprinkles so that they’re ready to make their own holiday treats!
- A snowball fight must be planned. Ask your guests to bring a pair of mittens to wear for the snowball fight. Snowballs can be made of crumpled-up recycled paper, pom pom balls, or if you’re brave, marshmallows (just be quick to clean them up)!
- Cool Craft: S’mores Ornament for the Christmas tree. Cut tan fun foam into squares as the graham cracker, a double piece of brown fun foam as the chocolate bar, and a fake marshmallow in the center, decorated with permanent markers. Add a small wire loop to the top for hanging, along with a thin red bow.
- Yummy Snack: Table-top s’more stations. For safety, post an adult at each station. Mini tabletop fire pits are available or you can make your own.
- You could even provide a Hot Cocoa Bar stalked with mini marshmallows and other tasty add-ins!
3. Aloha! Happy Hula Days Christmas Party
Take your Children’s Christmas Party in a non-traditional direction by hosting a tropical-themed Christmas party. Do some research and add some Christmas activities that happen in Hawaii! This theme is fun for those who live in a cold climate. A unique theme will certainly leave them talking!
Part of hosting parties and activities for our children’s ministry is to get the kids excited about their church and what goes on there. When they’re excited, they will tell their friends and be more apt to invite them to future activities. They will also bring home great memories to share with their parents!
Decor:
Greet all your guests at the door with a red or green faux lei. Encourage guests to wear brightly colored shirts. For decor, anything tropical goes. You could have palm leaves strung into a garland, bright tissue flowers, beach towel runners down the tables, or pineapple centerpieces with mini christmas lights strung through the leaves. Bring in a fake Christmas tree and decorate it with colorful flowers, birds, and sea shells. Hang a few beach balls from the ceiling.
Activities:
- Fun Game: Hula hoop Relay. Divide into teams. The first kid runs to get a hula hoop, brings it back to the team, puts it over their head and down to their feet, and steps out. The next person in line has to step in and lift it over their body and off their head, and so on down the line. The first team to go through the line and return the hoop back to the other side of the room wins!
- Cool Craft: Use a roll of brown kraft paper to make large sandcastle shapes on the wall. Give kids candy stickers, sticky back gems, buttons, and markers to decorate the sandcastle in gingerbread fashion. Use it as a backdrop to take photos of your guests.
- Yummy Snack: Make fun tropical punch, serve fruit salad, and even some fun luau cupcakes for your refreshment time.
4. Christmas In The Barn Party
You don’t have to live in the countryside to host this party, but if you do, you could host it in an actual barn! Wouldn’t that be fun? By focusing your decor and games on a ‘barn/farm’ theme, you can host this party anywhere. While bringing the aspect of a barn into your party, it makes a perfect segway to talk about Jesus being born in a manger and what that means to us. Using themes like this allows us to get kids to stop and think about the real events of Christmas and what it means to them.
Decor:
Decorate with red bandanas, red & white checked tablecloths, straw hats, or cowboy hats. Make a barn door out of cardboard to decorate your space. If you have it available, placing a couple of straw bales to sit on for a photo spot would be great. Have a tree decorated in red & white gingham, white ornaments with black cow spots, and other fun farm decor. Lanterns on the table (with flameless candles) are great for centerpieces.
Activities:
- Fun Game: Pin the tail on the Christmas Cow. Make a cutout figure of a cow, place a Santa hat on its head, and have the kids play the traditional game with blindfolds, placing the tale on the cow.
- Barnyard Bingo: You can buy premade sheets or go online to make your own. Another traditional game you could play is Cow-Cow-Pig (instead of Duck-Duck-Goose).
- Cool Craft: Making nativity scenes would pair perfectly with this theme.
- Yummy Snack: You could have red & green popcorn placed in a clear bag, wrapped in green paper ‘husks’. You can call it Christmas Corn! Cupcakes with white icing and cow spots are a sweet treat. Milkshakes would also be a special treat!
- Invite your guests to come dressed as a farmer. See what kinds of outfits they come up with. Don’t forget to take pictures to post on social media.
5. The Christmas Puzzle Party
Purchase an inexpensive children’s Christmas puzzle (25 -50 pieces). Send out a piece of the puzzle via snail mail to the children in your church with an invitation to your party. Ask them to bring their puzzle piece to the party.
On the day of the party, have the puzzle set up on a table in the entry. As guests arrive, have them place their piece into the puzzle. At the end of your party you can show the completed puzzle.
Even if there are people who didn’t bring a piece, you can use the missing pieces to lead into the devotional. Share about how missing a piece to the puzzle is like feeling incomplete. It doesn’t make us feel good. That’s just like not having Jesus as a part of our lives. He is that missing piece that can make our lives complete and full of joy!
Decor:
Traditional Christmas decor for this party will work, but you can cut puzzle shapes out of foam core and then cover them with holiday wrapping paper. You can use these to decorate the walls. Make a garland with construction paper puzzle pieces and write ‘Merry Christmas’ throughout the pieces. Use red and green tablecloths, and more Christmas puzzle pieces as centerpieces. This can be an activity as the kids sit down for refreshment time.
Activities:
- Fun Game: Play a Christmas Trivia Game. There are several available online or you can make your own Christmas questions for kids. Let children play individually or as a team.
- For another fun game, break into teams-have them solve a word puzzle about Christmas. The first team to solve wins a prize.
- Cool Craft: Make a Christmas ornament by painting puzzle pieces. You can pick up a puzzle at the thrift store and glue them together to form a small tree shape. Add glitter, put a hole through the top, and put a piece of gold ribbon through it to make a hanger.
- Yummy snack: Use a puzzle piece cookie cutter and make sugar cookies for the kids to decorate with icing and sprinkles. Use that same cookie cutter to cut pieces of cheese to go on a charcuterie tray with veggies. You can also use it to cut out a variety of party sandwiches.
- Order some nativity Christmas puzzles and send them home with each child as a party favor, reminding them of the lesson for the day!
6. Christmas Pancakes & PJ’s Party
Parties don’t always have to be in the afternoon or evening, so why not host a breakfast or brunch party for your children’s ministry? Invite guests to wear their favorite pj’s or if they are not comfortable doing so, encourage them to wear some silly slippers. This is a great party for connection and laughter. Making memories like this can impact children for years to come.
Decor:
Have festive holiday decor that is warm and inviting. Small tabletop trees as centerpieces, garlands, and lights make it exciting. Set up your pancake station with a variety of toppings for the children to choose from. Ask teens or seniors to step in as servers. Use mini chalkboards for menu boards. A hot cocoa bar with several add-ins will add to the festive atmosphere.
Activities:
- Fun Game: Pancake flipping game. This game is played like concentration or memory match, but you use round pancake-shaped cards, made by cutting out cardstock or using small paper plates. Print Christmas pictures and words to place on the backs of the cards (make sure to have 2 of each). Place cards, print side down on the table. Each kid will turn over 2 cards to try to find a match. Continue playing until all matches have been found.
- For another fun game, break into 2 teams. You will need 2 toy food pancakes. Place a frying pan at one end of the room for each team. Give the first person in line a spatula and hand them the toy pancake. When you say go, each kid puts the pancake on the spatula and walks it to the pan. They run back to the line and hand off the spatula. The next child runs down, scoops the pancake out of the pan, brings it back to the line, and hands it off. Continue playing until everyone in the line has gone and the last child brings the frying pan back to the team.
- Make a red carpet runway! We used a red tablecloth on the floor and Christmas lights down each side. Encourage the children to show off their PJs. Play some fun music and have the ‘paparazzi’ taking photos of everyone. It creates a fun memory.
7. Tree Trimming Party
This would be a great all-family party. An opportunity to connect with the adults and for the families to create bonds and connections with one another in your community. Decorating a tree together gives people time for conversation around the tree, sharing family traditions and what makes Christmas special for them.
Ask people in your small church to donate ornaments and decorations for the tree trimming to help keep costs down. You can use an artificial tree or a live tree if you live in an area where they are affordable. Make sure to have a countdown to turn your lights on, then join hands to sing some carols together around the tree. This party will not only build relationships but will make family and church memories.
Decor:
You can decorate in fun Christmas decor, a garland of trees would be fun. You just need enough to make it festive. Your tree will be a main area of decoration and can be used as a backdrop for photos too.
Activities:
- Fun Game: Break into family teams or mix families up. Give each team a bag containing a roll of green crepe paper, a roll of toilet paper, red & yellow construction paper, scissors, markers, and tape. Each team must choose one person to be their Christmas tree. When the time starts each team has 4 minutes to ‘Trim their Human Tree’. Have a judge determine the winners.
- Cool Craft: Make edible christmas trees out of sugar ice cream cones. Invert on a small paper plate, frost with green icing and decorate with mini candies, sprinkles, and crushed candy canes.
- Yummy Snack: Refreshments could be a potluck-style meal where each family brings something to the party. The church could provide beverages and dessert. Sharing a meal together deepens connection time.
- For a time of devotion, our ministry partner, CTA, Inc. has a big felt tree that you could hang on the wall. It comes with all the pieces to tell the story of Christmas. You could have kids take turns placing the items on the tree. They also have a free downloadable devotion to print for parents to take home.
8. Senior Center Sharing Party
Christmas is a great time to combine a fun activity with an opportunity to teach children about caring for others and showing Jesus’ love. Arrange for your children (and parents too) to go to a local senior center or nursing home to host a holiday party. This project will allow you to gather with the kids on more than one occasion to prepare for your event, as well as build relationships within your church family.
You’ll also get to know parents as they participate. On the day of the party, you will travel to the senior center and host a party, provide simple refreshments, play a game with them, and perform a song. Perhaps you can get your entire church family on board by donating slipper socks or scarves to give as gifts. This is a wonderful way to spread joy and allow the children to experience ministry firsthand!
Decor:
You won’t need to worry about decorations, the center will probably have their own, but you could bring a banner to hang up. Children could make the banner or you could have a local printer make you one, be sure to include the church’s name on your banner. Some decorative plates and napkins will add a festive touch to your refreshment table. If you choose to bring gifts, putting them in holiday gift bags is a nice addition to your table too.
Activities:
- Fun Game: Playing a simple game like Christmas Bingo would work well with seniors. Let the kids sit throughout the seniors or pair them up to play as a team. Let one or two kids be the callers. Have some fun Christmas conversation starters to ask the seniors while you get started:
- What did you do on Christmas Eve when you were little?
- Has anyone ever lit candles on their Christmas tree?
- What did you usually find in your stocking on Christmas morning?
- Getting the children engaged with the older people and giving them a real peek at history is a wonderful experience for them.
- Cool Craft: Before your party event, invite the children to make Christmas cards to bring to the center. Provide paper, embellishments, stamps, stickers, and markers to make some festive cards.
- Yummy Snack: Bring refreshments for all to enjoy, a simple punch, cupcakes or cookies, and a fruit platter for those who can’t eat sugar. Ask children and parents to be servers and help in the clean up as well.
- Prepare a song or carol for the kids to perform for the seniors group. They enjoy hearing from young people. If you have a pianist to join you, they could lead in some carol singing as well. Keep it simple, first verses only. Invite parents to join in too.
- Ask some of your best readers to read the Luke 2 account of the Christmas story. Have another child close in prayer.
- At the close of your party sing ‘We Wish You a Merry Christmas’ and hand out gifts to all.
Taking some photos with your new friends is a great way to keep memories alive.
It’s A Great Time For A Christmas Celebration
Christmas is a wonderful time of year for celebration, reflection, and pointing to the most incredible gift ever, that of Jesus Christ! We can have so many opportunities to teach our children during this time, as well as connecting and bringing joy to them as well. Many of the Christmas party ideas that we shared here are just a basis and theme from which you can find inspiration for your own small church. Use this article as a jumpstart to host your own event.
We love it when the Small Church community is able to put these ideas into practice! We would love to see pictures and hear about how your event came out. Please share them in our Facebook group!
Merry Christmas and Happy Ministry Moments!
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