Lightening Online

Over the past few days my blog reader has been filling up with posts about how stressed people are about how quickly Christmas is coming.  Or commenting on how they just aren’t getting into the “spirit” this year.  There’s even been a number with the word “humbug” in the title.

I know how they feel.  I’ve been there.  There’s every likelihood I’ll go there again.

Commercialism and perfectionism is squeezing the life out of Christmas.

I was discussing Christmas with my sister in law this past week.  A few years back I said we weren’t buying adult gifts for the siblings anymore.  She made a comment on how it does get expensive.  The thing for us wasn’t the money.  It was the stress of finding something that wasn’t a total waste of everybody’s time and money.  Finding the perfect gifts for everyone was completely STRESSING me out.

It was such a relief to have that burden lifted.

It was around that time that we decided we were going to SIMPLIFY CHRISTMAS.

I now don’t do anything “Christmassy” unless I feel like it.

Fortunately I generally LOVE Christmas and LOVE buying gifts so of course, that helps.

Some years we decorate the whole house.  Some years we don’t.

As long as we do Santa and the Tree, the kids are generally happy.

Some years we do Christmas craft and cooking.  Some years we don’t.

Some years we have more elaborate Christmas fare.  And some years we keep it really simple.

I remember 1 year we went away in the camper trailer for Christmas.  It was the first Christmas after my breakdown and I wasn’t ready to be around people yet.  Money was tight that year so we kept everything VERY simple.  I made a couple of basic salads before we left and cooked a turkey and bought some shaved ham.  All I did Christmas Day was cut up some basic salad items (tomato, cucumber, lettuce).  Dessert was a bought cheesecake.

It was the least effort I had EVER put into Christmas that year and do you know what????

It was AWESOME!!!!

It still ranks up there as one of the BEST Christmasses we have ever had.

So if you’re struggling to get into the “spirit” or feel like you’re just not going to achieve everything before the big day gets here, cut yourself some slack!!!!

There was nothing commercial or stressed about the very first Christmas (okay, maybe a little stress over the inn being full and of course, the labour!!!!  ).

Why do we let media and peer pressure force us into doing what we don’t want to do?

I don’t believe that means we lack the Christmas spirit.  Could be it’s quite the opposite in fact.

Dare to be different (if that’s what makes you happy).

Carve your own way this Christmas.

Focus on peace, joy, thankfulness, family and friends this Christmas.

The rest is all simply “trimming”.

Wishing you all a blessed, safe and happy Christmas. I hope you can find the time to relax amongst all the hustle and bustle of the season and the true Spirit of Christmas may shine through.

May we all be thankful for the things that we do have rather than focusing on what we don’t have. Most of us are blessed beyond comprehension and it can be easy to get disgruntled rather than being thankful.

The following clip is a great reminder of the true spirit of Christmas:

Thank you for your friendship and support this year and for taking the time to read and comment. I appreciate each and every one of you.

Blessings.

Image by Stéfan via FlickrEvery year, our local paper publishes Letters to Santa written by some of the local school children in Reception (and sometimes year 1). It’s always interesting to see what the children write (even more so when my own children are involved - quite a revelation in fact).

Here are a few that were published this year:

Dear Father Christmas, I like you. I only want a DVD of Beverley Hills Chihuahua. We watched this movie in Adelaide. We are going to Clare for Christmas. The house is a greeny sort of colour and my name is F*******. My brother is M**, my sister is A****. We have some baby kittens. We could give some, if you would like one.

How cute is that????

****

I love you Father Christmas. Can you bring me a motorbike because I have been good lots of times and K**** has been good lots of times too. Why don’t you give my Mum and Dad presents? Merry Christmas Father Christmas.

****

Dear Santa, I hope you have a happy day. I have tried my hardest to be good. I hope I get some presents. I want a new bike.

I love the “tried my hardest to be good”. So honest.

****

Dear Santa, Merry Christmas. Ho! Ho! Ho! I want a shotgun to shoot the emus.

*snort* I wonder if he’s a farm kid? These are published with full names under them - wonder if they’ll get a visit from some animal loving organisation?

****

Dear Santa Claus, for Christmas can I please have a remote control care and a surfboard and a book full of monsters, trucks and cars, a little cup of gold like the year 4/5/6 and pencils and textas in a pencil case. I hope you get this letter.

I wonder why some kids have a nice long list and others have 1 (or maybe not even anything) on their “wishlist” for Santa? Perhaps it’s a personality thing. I have 1 who could write a list of “wants” on request and 1 that hardly ever knows what they want (and 1 that’s too young to tell yet).

****

Dear Santa, Please can I have a book about Spencer

Who or What is Spencer? There’s one I haven’t heard of.

****

Dear Santa, you are special to us and we are special to you. Thank you for last years present. I like everything you got for me. I want an iPod and anything else that you give me. Ho! Ho! Ho! Merry Christmas.

I love those that have included a thank you for what they received last year.

Kids really make Christmas special don’t they?

Farmboy, in an effort to cheer me up the other day, made a comment along the lines of “only 7 more sleeps to Christmas”.

You see, it’s common for me to get VERY excited as Christmas draws near. I’m a HUGE fan of Christmas.

I turned to him and said “shut up”.

He looked like I had slapped him in the face.

It was an unusual response for me and a bit of a wake up call that I had really lost my way in the true meaning and spirit of Christmas. Life has been too busy of late and that’s just not how I want to approach this very special time of year.

So, today I want to focus on some of the things about Christmas that make me smile.

Seeing our Santa up a Gum Tree every time we come home (and the toots from motorists when they drive past):

Our imperfectly decorated Christmas Tree which reminds me that Christmas doesn’t need to be perfect in order to make people smile (and in fact, perhaps it’s better if it isn’t):

The fun of buying and wrapping gifts for others and the hope that what you give them will make them smile:

Taking time out for family with a very simple Christmas fare:

Our Sunday School nativity, reminding us of the true reason for the season:

My little Fairy in our local Christmas pageant (where the kids also got a small gift from Santa and the town put on a free movie):

There are plenty of reasons to smile in this Christmas Season. I invite you to join me in reflecting on what has made you smile in the lead up to Christmas. It really makes a difference to take a moment from the hustle and bustle and appreciate all the wonderful things this season represents.

If you’re new to Smiley Saturday, please read my Smiley Saturday page before adding your link to the Mr Linky below. Anyone is welcome to join at anytime but please link directly to your Smiley Saturday post and not to your blogs homepage.

You might also enjoy browsing some of the Christmas Crazy posts linked at Magnetoboldtoo. I’m sure there’ll be quite a few smiles and laughs amongst those.

Happy Smiley Saturday! I hope you’re all able to find your smiles amongst the busy-ness and craziness of this festive season.

When our children were younger, we felt a lot of pressure from extended family to “share” them at Christmas time. For a while they were the only children (particularly on Farmboy’s side of the family) and everyone wanted to spend Christmas with them. Being the people pleaser that I am, I always tried to accommodate, even though at times it went against what we’d have really liked to have done as a family. Not because we don’t enjoy spending Christmas with extended family but because we rarely got the chance to spend some quiet moments with our young children on Christmas Day.

So we began our own Christmas tradition of sharing a hot meal together at some point in the week leading up to Christmas. I’m not a big fan of cooking a hot meal on Christmas day. I prefer to prepare the meal so that there isn’t as much work to do on the actual day. But we all enjoy a hot turkey dinner (well, one of those rolled turkey breasts you buy in the freezer section) so it’s become somewhat of a tradition to do this as an immediate family tradition on a day other than Christmas Day.

It’s a simple affair. The way I’d personally LOVE Christmas Day to be. A $2 pack of bon bons, a Christmas tablecloth, a $1 bottle of Ginger Beer and a Sarah Lee cheesecake with cream for dessert.

Lleyton was great this year and really got into setting the table and serving the food to each person. He even followed it up with clearing plates from the table!!!!

If it’s a year where we’re travelling for Christmas, we’ll sometimes do our family gift on this occasion as well, particularly if it’s something that won’t travel well (or won’t fit).

While we normally hold this Family Christmas Dinner Christmas Eve or in the last few days before Christmas, this year we decided to do it early.

We splashed out a little (okay a lot) this year on a family present and we can’t take it with us when we go away at Christmas and we’re going to be away intermittently through January so we decided to hold our Traditional family dinner early and give the kids the gift early as well. That way they can play with it this week and early next week. It seemed cruel to give it to them and then they not be able to use it.

So, what is “IT”?

Even though we bought about the cheapest we could find (and yes, a chinese import I’m afraid), this was still more than we usually spend on our entire Christmas budget.

What the kids don’t know (yet) is that we have an ulterior motive. This will enable them to help out with the sheep work around the farm. Checking troughs and moving sheep around.

They’re pretty stoked with it!

Remind me next year that I MUST be ready for Christmas by December 1st.

On November 30th I felt I was doing really well with how far along I was in my organisation for Christmas. Nearly a month to go and I was *almost* ready.

I’m not sure almost was quite enough!

December kicked in and I’ve yet to find time to draw a breath.

It doesn’t help that we added in a surprise 60th, a 5th birthday party, a wedding and a dinner for my MIL’s birthday in that insane final week of school (which was last week here).

I thought I’d be right if I managed to survive last week.

This week was “recover week” and a chance to catch up on some housework (run in and out for 9 days straight and the house is wrecked and in desperate need of a clean) and get presents wrapped, along with some Christmas baking with the kids.

No problem!

Or maybe…..

Turns out I’m out every day this week, I’m tired and still most of my presents need wrapping.

Talk about the silly season!!!!

Well, all I can do is take 1 day at a time and hope that I’m not frantically trying to wrap presents the night before we head away for Christmas.

I feel like I need a “to do” list but I’m too scared to write one in case it freaks me out how long it is.

Singstar Princess brought home a book of stories she has written. They’ve been typed up and made into a book that can be kept. I’m sure she’ll love it when she gets older and can look back at what she wrote as a young child.

I thought I’d share one of those stories with you:

Kate And Santa

One Christmas Eve Kate and her family were setting up the Christmas tree and then they went to bed. Kate woke up she heard something. She went outside she saw Santa and his slave. Santa said come aboard so she did. Kate said “where is your workshop?” Santa answered “at the north pole”. Kate said “cool”. “So Kate what do you want for Christmas before we leave?” Kate said “you know my name and I want um a Nintendo DS of course.” “I know your name because I have a list of people who are naughty and good and you are good helping your parents.” Kate said to herself “this is going to be the best Christmas ever” The end.

My favourite bits are “Santa and his slave” and “you are good helping your parents”.

While our daughter’s name isn’t “Kate”, I’m pretty sure she wants a Nintendo DS for Christmas - it’s mentioned in more than one story in this book.

Do you usually try and get your kids what they ask for for Christmas? All 3 of mine have come up with things in the past week and none of them are what I’ve bought. This happens to me every year - the kids ask for something “last minute-ish” which is different to what I’ve already bought. And I’m torn between “be happy with what you’re given” and wanting it to be a “perfect” Christmas.

It’s been like Christmas around here this week with all sorts of parcels arriving in the post. We only get the mail once or twice a week but every time we’ve picked it up lately there have been parcels, parcels and more parcels!!!! Some things that I’ve ordered for gifts but also PRESENTS for me.

And guess what? PRESENTS make me smile. A LOT!!!!

I used to think that made me materialistic but now I understand that it’s one of my primary love languages. I enjoy GIVING gifts and I’m learning to enjoy receiving them (once upon a time I didn’t feel “worthy” to receive gifts).

One of the things I’m really enjoying through my online presence is participating in Secret Santa style swaps. I was involved in 2 this year and BOTH of them arrived this week.

The first was from my Aussie Bloggers Secret Office Santa:

Aren’t they beautiful? Thank you to whoever my Secret Santa was (I’m yet to find out - wonder if I ever will).

I also sent something pink as my gift to another Aussie Blogger (wonder if they read my blog and will get this hint?)

The other Secret Santa I participated in this year (as I also did last year) was as part of the Simple Savings forum. They set a limit of $5 and I enjoy the challenge of finding things to send to someone that are under that limit.

I haven’t had a chance to photograph what I got but it was a lovely Christmas handtowel, some soap, a couple of tree decorations and a penguin pin.

Also in the mail this week were a Beauty and Lace bag of goodies and a box of a new product I’ve been sent to try and to tell you about. More on that once I’ve had time to try them. The look rather interesting though.

With all the Christmas parties and concerts and so on that we’ve had this week, I think Christmas has well and truly arrived!!! As I write this (Friday night), Farmboy and the children are out at our local Christmas Tree event. So the kids will receive their first present from Santa tonight.

This weekend is a busy one. We have a wedding AND a birthday party on Saturday and then a Sunday School Christmas break-up (which I was responsible for buying and wrapping 50 gifts for - what fun!!!) and the kids are then performing at the town Christmas Carols so it’s going to be a rather busy weekend (which is why I’m home as I write this instead of out).

I hope you’re finding time in the busy-ness of the season to smile.

Happy Smiley Saturday everyone!

Since we have lived in this house, we’ve had a tradition of displaying a Santa in our front paddock. Santa is always a hit with the school bus kids, neighbours and passers by. So, over the weekend, Santa once again mysteriously appeared in our front paddock.

Each year we try to do something different with Santa. The first year he sat on an old Bulldog tractor. The next it was an old Fire Truck and last year he did the “Aussie” thing, waving from his deck chair with a cold drink in his hand.

After 3 years, poor old Santa was looking a little worse for wear. So, first task this year was to give him a fresh, new suit.

Then the fun part, a ride with Santa on the back of the ute:

I think Lleyton would like to do a cricket playing Santa next.

And this year, we have a truly Aussie Santa once again:

Santa Up A Gum Tree!!!!

Ho, Ho, Ho….. Merry Christmas!!!!

Have I mentioned how much I LOVE Christmas????

The Christmas Season in our home is heralded by the Credit Union Christmas Pageant in Adelaide (and the subsequent arrival of Santa as part of that parade). When I was a child, it was a tradition to watch the pageant on TV in the morning and then put the Christmas Tree up that afternoon.

We started this tradition with our own children but the past couple of years we’ve put it off until after Trailer Boys birthday (which is December 1st). This year the kids were asking, so we decided to put it up Sunday (a week after the pageant but earlier than December).

I guess this means for us, the Christmas season has started. You can’t have too much of a good thing right?

The kids were SO excited and did lots of dancing around the lounge room during the tree decorating and afterward.

Here is Farmboy putting the tree together while the kids watch:

I remember as a child how loooonngggg it felt waiting during this part. All you want to do is get started with the fun bit - the decorating!

And here we are a decorating:

Once upon a time I had a more “magazine-ready” tree. Colour co-ordinated and perfectly balanced. These days we have a very “kid-decorated” look to the tree, complete with all sorts of home-made decorations. I will admit that it took a bit of an effort to step back and let them do it “their way”. They won’t be young for long and I want to enjoy this part of Christmas while we have them. There’ll be time for “perfect” Christmas Trees later (although I think I’ll keep the hand-made decorations).

And of course, the finished product:

Yes, we already have presents underneath. Aunty Santa has already been. I had lots of fun shopping for my nieces and nephews this year. We’ve already done presents with family on the East Coast but the rest of the gifts were languishing in the office. So I was pleased to get the tree up and have somewhere to put them. It feels good to have this part of Christmas sorted, wrapped and ready to go.

Want a sneak peak at what’s inside these presents? Here you go (any sister in law’s reading this might want to look away now if you want to keep it a surprise):

I bought all of these presents from the kindy toy fundraising catalogues. It made life so much easier and I really enjoyed browsing through the 4 catalogues I had looking for something that would be suitable. I tend to be a bit of a “perfectionist” when it comes to gifts - always wanting to get the perfect thing with the perfect “wow” factor. I’m trying to be realistic in that it isn’t really possible. If I can’t always get it right for my own children, how can I expect to get it right every time for my nieces and nephews? Anyway, I REALLY hope they like what I’ve chosen (and yeah, I did go a teeny bit over budget this year on some of them - but I had so much fun that I’m sure that counts for something!!!).

Now, I’ll leave you with a final shot of my little “santa”:

He’s so excited about the tree and Christmas and starting school visits and his upcoming 5th birthday (complete with pirate party if mum manages to get it organised). Life is good when you’re an “almost 5 year old”.

Anyone else got there tree up yet???

Ho, Ho, Ho…..