Tips to Having More Fun this Christmas

Does Christmas excite you? or does it stress you out?

Do you look forward to this time of year? or do you secretly dread it?

Is your Christmas filled with fun and laughter? Or is it harried and hurried?

Are you able to relax and soak in the moments and memories? or do you just feel the pressure to do all things and buy all the things?

If I had to guess, I’d say most of you are somewhere right in the middle, feeling all of these things at some point during the holidays. But it doesn’t have to be this way.

I absolutely LOVE Christmas. All the things! The lights, the music, the decorations, the events and activities, the parties and get-togethers, the gifts, the cooler weather, and even Black Friday shopping. I realize that part of this could be my go-go-go personality; but on the flip side that same personality has the potential to lead me to a place where I could become overwhelmed and stressed. How do we combat the stress and the commercialism of the season? I think I’ve got it narrowed down to two things. Just two simple things that will make my and your Christmas MORE FUN!

SLOW DOWN

Just recently, I spent a whole day running errands and doing all the normal things that moms do on a daily basis. One of those things included a trip to the grocery store with my social, loud, and energetic two-year-old. Normally, I’m always in a hurry. In a hurry to get my shopping done. In a hurry to get through the fastest checkout line. In a hurry to get home in time for nap. And while I’m in a hurry I’m usually thinking about all of the next things I need to do or I’m on my phone trying to multitask. I’m not paying attention, and I’m not present, and I’m not patient. BUT, this day was different. I decided that today I was in no rush. I ended up behind a guy checking out that was literally doing his grocery shopping for the whole month. I knew this because I wasn’t too hurried or distracted to talk to him. He told me (and the cashier) about how he lived pretty far away on lots of property, and he didn’t like to make the trip into town very often. I took the time to notice his long gray pony tail and his very patriotic shirt. He made jokes about me having my baby while I had to wait forever for him in line. I laughed. While I was waiting I actually looked at my kid and talked to her too. We talked about all the things she saw in line, and I let her slowly help me unload all the groceries, methodically making sure nothing fell over on the grocery slidey thing. When it was finally our turn to check out, they asked if she wanted a balloon. I said “sure!” Then, when the sweet bagger kid wanted to fill it with helium for her and walk away from bagging for a minute, I wasn’t bothered. When he came back and really wanted to tie it on her wrist himself – even though it was a bit challenging for him – I waited patiently for him to figure it out. You could tell he was really enjoying being able to help and give something special to a little girl. When I was done, the cashier thanked me for my patience. Me. Patient. 🙂

What I realized that day, was that SLOW was more fun. I didn’t feel stressed or angry and annoyed or impatient. I didn’t snap at anyone or ignore anyone. I still got everything done that I needed to do, but I had more fun doing it. and maybe nap time got pushed back 10 minutes, but that 10 minutes was worth avoiding all those other negative things.

When I apply this to Christmas, I have to remind myself that less is more and slow can be better. This year instead of getting all my Christmas decor up in one day, it took me two. I went to bed with my counters scattered with “stuff” and the lights not put up on the stair well yet, but I had fun with my kids and husband. We played with our nativity set, and took a break from decorating to go to horse-back-riding lessons (which I may have been tempted in the past to let my husband just take them so I could finish and I would have missed it!). We have several events and activities on our calendar this month, but we have strategically chosen the ones that matter most to our family. The ones where we can spend time with loved ones and time with just out family. We chose activities that encourage and remind us of the true meaning of the seasons – Jesus. Which brings me to my second – and best – tip for making Christmas MORE FUN.

CELEBRATE JESUS

If I could tell you ONE thing, it would be this: Christmas isn’t about lights or presents or trees or Santa. It’s also not about you or your kids. And it’s not really about giving and family either. All of those things are great (except Santa in my opinion…you can check out last year’s Christmas blog to read why), but Christmas is about celebrating something even better and more magical than all of those things combined. It’s the “birthday” celebration of our Savior.

Christmas is fun in our house and we don’t even do Santa! GASP! I get asked this questions aaaaallllllll the time: “but isn’t that taking the magic/fun out of Christmas?” NO. NOPE. NO WAY. DEFINITELY NOT. That’s just silly to me. Why? Because JESUS IS FUN and JESUS IS MAGICAL! And if I don’t tell and teach and show my kids that now, it will be really hard to do it later.

My kids think it’s really fun to play with the nativity sets we put up at Christmas. We collect new ones every year, and we have some old favorites too. My kids think it’s really fun to do an advent reading from Scripture and open an ornament that tells the story of Jesus. My kids favorite Christmas movie is “The Nativity.” They make Christmas lists with the names of people they want to buy gifts FOR – not just lists to tell us what they want for themselves. We actually had to ask them to write a list for themselves this year. And you know what was on their lists???? “nativity toys” “nativity books” “a good Christmas” and “an American Girl doll that looks like me” and a “giant stuffed unicorn.” (I mean they are normal kids and like toys too:)

Some of their favorite things to do at Christmas include making Jesus’ birthday cake, going to the local church that puts on a live nativity every year, and spending time with and vacationing with family. My kids don’t freak out when we tell them we have to eat before we open presents because we’ve tried really hard to not make that the most important thing. And when we do open gifts they are most excited about giving us the gifts they bought for us first.

Now hear this….I’m not saying we’ve got it down perfectly. We still argue and fight and get stressed out and impatient with each other. We. Are. Normal. But if we aren’t at least trying, what’s the point of all this? Remember, Christmas isn’t about keeping up with the Jones’s. It’s not about the presents and commercialism that flood your inbox and news feed. It’s not about making sure your kids get every ridiculously expensive thing on their list. It’s not about making it to every party and every light show and every Santa photo op. Seriously. Decide what is most important to you and then be intentional about making those things happen. For us, that’s Jesus and family. So we choose things/events/activities/etc… that highlight Jesus’ birth and things that allow us to slow down and be present with one another.

So SLOW DOWN and CELEBRATE JESUS. When you do these things, it takes the focus off of all the wrong stuff that bogs us down and stresses us out and puts it all in perspective. Do it; I dare you. and I promise you will HAVE MORE FUN this Christmas.