Mid-Autumn is the festival I'd recommend to anybody with a small child, and I say that as somebody who has now done a good many festivals with a good many small children in a city that isn't the one I grew up in.
The reason is simple. It happens outdoors after dark, it moves slowly, it involves walking and looking up, and the central activity is carrying a light around. There's no seated meal to sit through, no performance to be quiet during, and nothing that has to happen at a particular minute. For a toddler that's close to ideal, and for a family with a child who finds crowds hard it's one of the few festival evenings that can be done on your own terms. Or so I think. Dominic may remember it differently.
Nine things to do
Almost all of these cost nothing, and the ones that involve making something count for more to a two-year-old than anything you can buy.
- Walk with a lantern after dark. This is the whole festival for a toddler and everything else is optional. Twenty minutes around your own block counts.
- Make the lantern together from a paper cup, a jar or a milk carton. The making is half the evening, and Holly at two was far more interested in the process than the result.
- Look at the moon properly, on a balcony or from a window if you'd rather not go out at all.
- Eat pomelo, which is a good toddler fruit once you take the membrane off, and put the peel on her head, because that's what the peel is for.
- Read a moon story. There are several versions of the Chang'e legend written for small children and they hold up.
- Do a moon-phase craft with paper plates, which sounds like a stretch and is the thing my six-year-old still needs.
- Give her a flashlight of her own. A lantern with a battery tea light inside is safer and equally magical.
- Sing something. Any song works; the point is the walking and the noise you make while you do it.
- Take a photograph early in the evening while everybody is still cheerful, and then stop.
More to make
Mooncake, and why not
Mooncake isn't a food for babies, and the pressure to share it is strong, so here are the reasons.
A traditional baked mooncake is extremely high in sugar and the lotus paste is very dense. A salted egg yolk is a large salt load in an object that happens to be exactly the shape and size that lodges in a small airway. Snowskin mooncake has a glutinous skin that's sticky and doesn't break up well in the mouth. None of that is a reason for anxiety and all of it is a reason to say no easily and without a debate.
| Food | Under 1 | 1-3 years | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Baked mooncake | No | A thin sliver at most | Very high sugar; lotus paste is dense |
| Salted egg yolk | No | No | Salt load, plus a choking-shaped object |
| Snowskin mooncake | No | A small piece | Glutinous skin is sticky: cut small |
| Pomelo | Yes, membrane off | Yes | Good toddler fruit |
| Water chestnut | Chopped fine | Quartered | Hard and round: a choking risk whole |
| Taro, steamed | Yes, mashed | Yes | Soft and mild |
| Yam paste dessert | No | Small amount | Usually very sweet |
A one-year-old who has a sliver of the pastry and none of the filling is fine. A baby under one has no business anywhere near any of it, and isn't missing anything she'll remember.
Lanterns, and the candle question
I'll be brief and unambiguous here, because this is the one real hazard of an otherwise gentle festival.
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- Use battery tea lights or LED lanterns for anybody under school age. They look the same at night and nobody has ever complained.
- If older children are carrying candle lanterns, keep them well away from the little ones and away from anything that can catch.
- Keep lanterns out of prams and carriers entirely. A lantern above a sleeping baby is a bad idea however it's lit.
- Check for small parts on cheap plastic lanterns before they're handed over, since the batteries in particular are a serious swallowing hazard.
- Do it in an open space, on a flat surface, with more adults than children if you can manage it.
What time to go out
This is the practical question that decides whether the evening works, and the answer is earlier than the festival itself. Go out at dusk, at the point where it's dark enough for a lantern to look like something and early enough that a toddler is still herself, which is around half past six to half past seven for most young families, comfortably before the crowds arrive. Then come home. The temptation is to stay for the part where it gets busy, and there's nothing there for a two-year-old. I've taken five children through a good many festival evenings, and one of them, my eldest, taught me the best thing I know about all of them: leave while it's still going well. Dominic is autistic, and for years I read the moment he needed to go out several minutes after he needed to go out. Now I go early, I watch for the signs, and we leave before anybody is upset. That works for every child in the family.
Questions from the group chat
Can babies eat mooncake?
No. Traditional mooncake is extremely high in sugar and fat, and the salted egg yolk is both very salty and a choking-shaped object. A toddler over one can have a thin sliver at most.
Are candle lanterns safe for children?
Use LED lanterns for anyone under about six. A candle inside a paper lantern held by a small child in the dark is how paper lantern fires happen, and they spread quickly.
What can a toddler do at Mid-Autumn Festival?
A short lantern walk after dark, a pomelo-skin hat, making a milk-carton lantern, eating pomelo segments, and looking at and naming the moon.
What's a pomelo hat?
The peel of a pomelo scored into segments and eased off whole, then worn. It's a traditional Mid-Autumn thing to do with children, costs nothing, and the fruit gets eaten afterwards.
What time should you take a toddler lantern walking?
Just after sunset, around seven in Singapore. Dark enough for the lanterns to show and early enough to get home for a bath.
The evidence
This guide is general information, written to help you understand a topic and ask better questions. It is not medical advice and does not replace your own doctor, midwife or paediatrician. Anything that worries you about your baby belongs with them.