New Year is always a great time to celebrate, to be thankful for the blessings from the ending year and to look forward to the start of the year.

New Year is best celebrated with your whole family. Kids and grown-ups alike, enjoy counting down to midnight and welcome with New Year with a toast (for the grown ups) and exchange hugs and kisses with each other.

Here are a few ideas to help you have a great family New Year's Celebration:

Hire a babysitter

If you have toddlers or infants, try to find a babysitter to care for them during the festivities. A lot of people book babysitters for the New Year so make sure you book one ahead of time. Babies sleep early so make sure you keep the noise at a decent level.

For preschoolers

If your kids are old enough to join the celebration, let them. Tell your kids that you'll be having a New Year's Eve party. You can take them shopping and allow them to choose their party snacks and some noisemakers and other party items. Or, to spend some time together, create these party favors together.

Since it's New Year, perhaps you can let the kids stay up late, just this once. The neat thing is that kids usually start to feel sleepy way before midnight. That means you can welcome the New Year 2 or 3 hours earlier, put on your party hats, eat your snacks and send the kids to bed.

For older kids

If you have older kids plan activities for them too. Gather around the piano and play your favorite Christmas carols. You can play games like charades or rent funny holiday movies and watch them together. You can also let the older kids help you around the kitchen or supervise them in preparing party snacks for the family.

You can also plan intimate activities for the family. You can ask each member to list down what their hopes and resolutions for the coming year will be on a piece of paper and seal them all in an envelope. You can open it the following New Year's Eve to see if their hopes and resolutions were fulfilled.

After the party's over, save the kids' party favors. You can use them again for the following New Year's Eve. And perhaps one day you can show them to your kids when they're older and look back at all those fond memories.