Italian Christmas for Kids: Activities to Try at Home

A folded letter, a cardboard sheep and a number called across the table give children something to do with Italian Christmas. Start with one activity that fits your household, then leave room for the questions it brings. Who is Santa Lucia? Why does the presepe have shepherds? Why is there another stocking in January?

Italian families answer those questions in different ways. Gifts, meals and religious observance vary between regions and homes; a child with relatives in several places may know more than one version. These activities bring a few of those traditions home, whether Italy is around the corner or across an ocean.

Make a calendar with three doors

Fold three pieces of card in half and write one date on each: 13 December, 25 December and 6 January. Inside, draw a donkey, a Nativity star and a stocking. Open each card together and let a child explain the picture before adding the story. Keep the cards on a shelf where they can be rearranged into a little calendar.

Turn the back of the cards into a small map. Mark Bergamo for Santa Lucia and Urbania for the Befana, then add a town connected with your own family. The places make the differences visible: this is a collection of local and family customs. If your household celebrates another way, give that tradition its own card rather than squeezing it into someone else’s calendar.

Write a Santa Lucia letter

In Bergamo, the waiting belongs to the night of 12–13 December. Letters, gifts and a donkey are part of the local Santa Lucia tradition. Read the Santa Lucia guide together, then ask each child what they would put in a letter. A picture works as well as a written list; an adult can write down a younger child’s words underneath.

Fold the page, write Santa Lucia’s name on the outside and choose a place for it at home. Ask what the donkey might need on its journey and draw that beside the letter. You can add a wish for somebody else or a question about the story. Families that do not exchange gifts on this date can still use the letter to discover a tradition from another part of Italy.

Build a small paper presepe

A presepe depicts the Nativity, with Mary, Joseph and the infant Jesus at its centre. Shepherds, animals, buildings and everyday figures can extend the scene into a miniature world. Begin with a shallow box lid or a firm cardboard base, paper, pencils and a glue stick. Give an adult the cutting jobs and let children choose colours, draw figures and decide where they will stand.

The paper presepe project takes you through a stable, landscape and figures. Divide the work by interest: one person draws the roof, another makes sheep, another adds a path. Fold a little tab beneath each paper figure so it can stand on the base. Leave space around the central group; a scene with a few well-placed pieces is easier to move and talk about.

Ask each maker to introduce one figure and explain where it is going. A shepherd might be approaching the stable; a neighbour might be carrying a basket. Keep the Christian story clear while allowing the imagined village to grow around it. Save an unfinished figure in an envelope beside the scene, ready for another afternoon, instead of making completion the price of joining in.

Give children a part in tombola

Tombola draws numbers from 1 to 90. A standard card has 15 numbers in three rows, with five numbers in each row. Put an experienced reader beside a child who wants help finding the called number, and let them mark the same card together. Agree on the game’s stages before the first draw so everyone knows what they are watching for.

Ambo, terno, quaterna and cinquina require two, three, four and five called numbers in the same horizontal row; tombola needs all fifteen numbers on the card. The complete tombola rules explain the sequence. Play without money and give children a visible job: checking the master board, repeating a number or helping verify a claimed row. A shared card lets somebody join for part of a game without taking on the whole evening.

Choose one song or one film

Make a listening moment by choosing one recording and leaving other distractions aside. Ask children which sound they notice first and whether they can remember the melody afterwards. Tu scendi dalle stelle is an Italian Christmas carol; our Christmas songs and films guide gives named recordings and other starting points. A familiar song from your own household can sit beside it.

For a story connected with the Befana, consider La freccia azzurra, Enzo D’Alò’s 1996 animated film drawn from Gianni Rodari’s book. Choose it after checking that its story suits your children. Afterwards, let each person draw a toy from the story or invent a destination for its journey. Keep the drawing open-ended: siblings need not remember the same scene or agree on a favourite character.

Leave a stocking for the Befana

In the folk story, the Befana travels by broom and brings sweets or coal during the night of 5–6 January. On the evening of the 5th, choose a stocking, add a paper name tag and decide where it will wait. A child can draw a broom, a roof or the route the visitor might take. This is another story to tell together as Christmas reaches Epiphany.

Urbania, in the Marche, is closely associated with the Befana and holds a festival in her honour. Use the Befana and Epiphany guide to explore that connection, then find the town on your calendar map. At home, the next morning can be simple: open the stocking, revisit the three cards and ask which activity everyone would like to keep for another year.

Put the letters, drawings and a favourite paper figure into one envelope with the year written on it. The wider Christmas guide can help you follow the traditions that caught your family’s attention. Next time, begin with what the children remember: a donkey, a number, a cardboard village or a stocking that waited until January.