I love the holiday season. I go way overboard every year with singing carols, watching Christmas movies, making gingerbread, buying presents, and generally going a little crazy. I eagerly await December so I can kick off with all these things and I am a little sad around the 27th of December when Christmas is over, even though I am lucky enough to celebrate my anniversary on the 5th of January. But… Occasionally instead of just enjoying it, I can begin to feel a little stress over it… So, here are my tips for helping you if you’re starting to stress out over the holiday season!
Everyone is supposed to enjoy themselves
Firstly, as parents, we can get really focused on making holidays fun for our kids, I mean who doesn’t want their kids to have the BEST CHRISTMAS EVER?! But don’t forget, it wasn’t that long ago that you, too, were a kid! You might have forgotten, but you’re supposed to enjoy the holidays too! There’s no point in working yourself to the bone and not enjoying any of it! We don’t need to try so hard to make these times with our families special. As Sophia Petrillo of Golden Girls says, “Quality time has to come naturally. It happens when you’re not thinking about it. Like when we’re cutting vegetables together. That’s quality time.” Rather than spending too much of your time working to make everyone else’s time special, spend time with them. We’re all children at heart, so don’t forget to play this Christmas.
Suggested Activity: Prior to Christmas morning get a bunch of Nerf or water pistols (depending on the temperature of your location) and tape them to the back or underside of the couch and chairs. After everyone’s unwrapped their presents and that natural lull begins, reach for your weapon of choice, tell everyone that they have one too, and proceed to have a full family battle!
You don’t need all the dollarbucks
It sure is getting pricy out there! My goodness, even the cheap old staples seem to have gone up so much in this last year. I’ve also noticed toys costing so much more than they used to. And of course, these days even if we don’t watch a lot of regular commercial TV (we never watch normal TV in our house, only Netflix and other streaming services, so my daughter has almost never seen commercials and whenever she does she’s just baffled that people put up with them!), we still see these elaborately decorated homes on social media or in movies and it can feel like to have a special holiday season you need to go out and buy ALL the decorations and presents! But I’ve found that really isn’t the case. Now, I am a creative person so I can make things for my family, but there’s only so much time I can devote to crafting with all my other responsibilities! I do like to buy gifts for my family, I love it, in fact, but I do it well in advance and wait for the things I want to be on sale before I get them. I had all my shopping done and hidden away before December even started! I shop wholly online, too, so can shop around for something I want to find the best deal on it. It’s always worth checking eBay, too! You’d be shocked how often people put unwanted but unopened gifts up on eBay for WAY cheaper than the recommended retail price.
Suggested Activity: Rather than buying a bunch of decorations, buy a reem of copy paper! Make snowflakes as a family, and paper chains to hang as garlands! Christmas shaped paper doll chains, or cut snowy icicle shapes to put on the edges of windowsills, mantles, even door lintels! You’d be SHOCKED how beautifully you can decorate with just home-made paper decorations! AND it’s quality time with your family!
You can just stay home
When I was a child, my extended family would have a big family Christmas. There are family members I would only see each year during this gathering. My great-grandmother was the matriarch of the family, so the event was nearly always at her house, and would last most of the day! We would all sit around in her living room, and as I was the first and only great grandchild for the first twelve years of my life, I was ‘Santa’s little helper’ and would hand out all the gifts that everyone had brought along. We would have a big Christmas dinner, and I eagerly awaited when they would ‘flame the pudding’. In case your family didn’t do this, it’s when you pour brandy sauce over a pudding, and light it on fire! It burns only for less than a minute, but because of the alcohol in it, it would burn blue! It was like magic! Everyone would enjoy catching up with one another and chatting, and when I inevitably got bored of their grown-up conversations, my uncle would take me to a near-by park. I loved these family Christmases! But here’s the thing that really set them apart from most people’s extended family holiday celebrations; we never held them on Christmas day. They were usually in the week before Christmas, which meant that Christmas day was spent at home, enjoying presents and food and staying in my pyjamas all day!
On the first Christmas my now husband and I spent together as a couple, way back in 2001, we spent Christmas day with his family and I was shocked when his mother declared around 11am that everyone was now to pack into the car and go visit the extended family! It was not a comfortable way to spend the holiday, and I think may have been one of the only times we agreed to do so.
Suggested Activity: Talk to your extended family about celebrating the holidays together a few days before Christmas day.
Celebrate any way you like
Each family has their own spin on celebrating the holidays, and it’s usually a blend of the ways in which the previous generation spent their holidays. My husband and I both had family traditions we grew up with, and our traditions now are a blend of those, plus those we invented ourselves! People often forget that even the oldest traditions were new once, and that you can spend your family holidays any way you like! Just because your family always had roast ham and roasted vegetables for Christmas doesn’t mean you have to! You might like a spread of different salads and barbecue meat, as is popular here in Australia! We like to mix up what we do for dinner, but we did invent some special yearly traditions that are now unmissable! My daughter and I make gingerbread each year, one construction and a bunch to eat! Every year we do a different construction, too. We’ve done the quintessential house, but last year, for example, we did a clock tower and this year we’re doing a Baba Yaga hut! Another tradition I personally love, is that I drink spiced mead whilst wrapping presents and watching Scrooged! We also try to watch a Christmas movie every day of December! You can make up any tradition that makes you all happy! Go for it!
Suggested Activity: Brainstorm a fun new tradition to do as a family each year (maybe a family water fight or snowball fight), and a special one just for you or you and your spouse (maybe a Christmas Eve bubble bath to relax and unwind in together).
How ever you celebrate and whatever you’re celebrating this year, I hope you all have a lovely time in the company of those you love most!
Happy Holidays!
Elowen
