Tips for Baby's First Christmas with HEINZ BABY

As I get ready to watch Toronto’s Santa Claus parade today, it’s hard to believe Hannah will be celebrating her third Christmas this year. As a January baby, the first time Hannah experienced the festive season she was almost 11 months old. Here’s a list of the top 5 things I wish Santa had told me to prepare for Baby’s First Christmas.

Buy batteries. This seems like a no brainer, but there are toys out there you assume don’t require batteries. Since Christmas was Hannah’s first taste of receiving multiple gifts at once, we ran out of batteries before we ran out of toys that required them.

To wrap or not to wrap, that is the question. It was a lot easier for Hannah to grab things from festive bags with tissue paper versus pulling off the Elmo wrapping…even if she was excited to see a million festive Elmos on a box. Much like the batteries, my major faux pas of Christmas 2012 was purchasing Hannah a play set, wrapping said play set in the Elmo wrapping paper (see aforementioned box in Part 2). At 11 months, Hannah wanted to play immediately. Constructing the play set took awhile. Now we build things then creatively wrap it. If the child is opening the creatively wrapped gift at home, no harm done and no patience required on the baby’s part. 

Don’t overextend your family. The holidays call for a lot of visiting. We chose to only attend one party per weekend, and to leave early so baby could be in bed at bedtime. Babies don’t understand the holidays – they just understand they are tired and need sleep. Do what's best for your babe and the members of your family who live under your roof.

Festive foods for all.  Hannah loved sitting at the holiday table with us, but wasn't necessarily interested in the food on our plates. She enjoyed some HEINZ BABY Food - Vegetables & Turkey of course. And she loved snacking on Original Biscuits while the adults around her enjoyed chocolates and candy canes.

Capture each moment - good or bad! Baby only has one First Christmas, document it as best as you can! I appreciate all the videos and photos we have, and I think Hannah will get a real kick out of seeing photos and videos from that special day.

What tips would you share for new parents celebrating baby’s first Christmas?

Disclosure: I received Heinz food as part of this post. As always, the opinions on this blog are my own.

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