Last year, I was really bummed about our Christmas season. (YES! I'm talking about Christmas in October. Get over it!) The house wasn't it's fullest Christmas-y self. I was stressed and grouchy because of it. This year, I am determined to change that. HOW? Well, first, we are going to start decorating on Nov. 2nd. The big tree isn't going up until closer to Thanksgiving but I'm hoping the rest of the house is done by then! WHY? Well, I have bigger things I want to accomplish in December and I always fall in love with my house when it's decorated for Christmas and I could use a house pick me up, if you know what I mean. So, what's the BIGGER things I want to accomplish this December? I have decided that we will do something special EVERY day from Dec. 1st to Dec. 24th to celebrate and I'm pretty excited about that. They will range in variety from doing something fun as a family to doing service projects or just something nice for someone else. I wanted to go ahead and get this out there in blog-land so that you can either make your own plans to celebrate Christmas differently this year or help me with different ideas. Some of mine are a little iffy. Here's the list that I've come up with so far:
1. Family Game Night (hoping this will help us SLOW down during such a busy season so we can spend time with each other)
2. Do something nice for our postal worker (they work EXTRA hard during this season and our postal carrier was working after 6pm the other night...they need a slap on the back for all their hard work!)
3. The Nutcracker (a tradition I plan on keeping with Anna)
4. Take goodies to our church staff (they work EXTRA hard too during this season)
5. Set up for church (our church is multi-site which means that we only go to church together on major holidays and we have to rent out the convention center to have church on Christmas Eve. that means setting it up to look as much like our regular church buildings as possible.)
6. Invite someone we don't know to church on Christmas Eve.
7. Donate food to the food pantry.
8. Daddy and Anna date (they haven't done this in awhile. we all believe it's important for Reed and Anna to spend one on one time so we're going to make sure that happens this Christmas. her relationship with her dad will determine the kinds of relationships she has with other men in her life so this is a BIGGIE!)
9. Go out for hot chocolate. (simple and easy but it helps us spend time together)
10. Make ornaments together (something we used to do every year but have missed the past year or so- we have fun and everyone gets one!)
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| These are salt dough ornaments we made several years ago. They still hang on our tree! |
13. Send a Christmas card to a deployed soldier or sailor. (surely, we'll know someone who will be gone this holiday season that would appreciate some Christmas cheer. I already have someone in mind!)
14. Watch our favorite Christmas movie---ELF! (we love this. we don't limit it to Christmas either.)
15. Go to Christmas Town at Busch Gardens.
16. Make a gingerbread house.
17. Look at Christmas lights around town
18. Visit the Coleman's Nursery exhibit in Portsmouth (this is something i did as a girl and something i loved! they moved it from the nursery to downtown Portsmouth in 2004. we've taken anna several times but it's been a few years. last time she went, she cried because many of the exhibits scared her. no joke!)
19. Be a secret Santa to someone and drop a little gift off as a surprise. (this will be a small gift- maybe a $5 starbucks card, a candy bar and an ornament)
20. Read the Christmas Story from the Bible as a family.
21. Help a friend in need.
22. Have a birthday party for the big JESUS!
23. Make another country's traditional Christmas dinner together. (oh, this one should be FUN! maybe we can do Canada since they eat just the same stuff! no, really, if you have a better idea, let me know!)
24. Get a new book and read some of it together.
Because of our hectic schedule, I'm going to have to pick wisely when we'll do each activity. When I get a better idea about our month, I'll add them to a calendar of sorts so that we can mark them off. I'm really excited about it though. And, some of these may change. I'm not sure about that foreign dinner. If someone has a better suggestion, I'm all ears. We also do a candy advent that I made several years ago. You can see some of them here: Stockings I am hoping though that by making our Christmas more purposeful that we don't feel so rushed and frazzled during what is always a hectic time. What are you going to do differently during this holiday season to make it MORE memorable and LESS stressful? It's time to start thinking about it! Dec. 1st will be here before you know it.
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