Caution-this is a rambling post-
My brother in law called last night and I think we've got Christmas plans taken care of. We'll spend Tuesday night (the 23rd) with Kevin's family, do Christmas morning with just the 5 of us, then head North to Abilene Christmas afternoon. I'm so excited to decorate our house, make cookies and fudge with the girls and do advent devos and light the purple and pink candles as a family.
So, Kevin and I are brainstorming gift ideas for everyone. I really struggle with this, because I WANT to give gifts and presents to everyone. My heart wants to show my family how much I love them and how much they mean to me. But I/we usually don't know WHAT to get everyone. We don't NEED anything. No one in our family NEEDS anything. I want to give the girls something to open on Christmas morning, but in the back of my head, keep thinking they're gonna get so much stuff from everyone else. Why spend money on stuff that I'll probably toss in a few months? Avery wants a new bike. If we get Ave the bike, we need to get something big for McKenna too, right? We could get McKenna a dollhouse. We already have a dollhouse that Avery got when she turned 3. Where will we put another dollhouse? We need to get Presley something, but she doesn't need anything, but diapers and wipes. Do Kevin and I need to exchange gifts, just to show the kids that Santa didn't forget us? Kevin and I usually don't do gifts, just b/c all of the money goes to everyone else (there's 21 people in our 2 families). Do we buy stuff for each other for the girls' sake. Ugh, the thoughts in my head go on and on about stuff that doesn't even matter, long term. I guess I'm growing tired of buying stuff. Wow-never thought I'd say that. I'm tired of de-cluttering my house and throwing things away that we spent money on, then decided we didn't need (read-mostly the older girls' toys)
We didn't make it to Abilene today, hopefully tomorrow though. Didn't get as much school and laundry done yesterday, as I'd hoped. It's 11:30 and I'm still in my pjs, so today's not looking much better. Thank goodness, Avery's teacher can wear pjs to class!
My brother in law called last night and I think we've got Christmas plans taken care of. We'll spend Tuesday night (the 23rd) with Kevin's family, do Christmas morning with just the 5 of us, then head North to Abilene Christmas afternoon. I'm so excited to decorate our house, make cookies and fudge with the girls and do advent devos and light the purple and pink candles as a family.
So, Kevin and I are brainstorming gift ideas for everyone. I really struggle with this, because I WANT to give gifts and presents to everyone. My heart wants to show my family how much I love them and how much they mean to me. But I/we usually don't know WHAT to get everyone. We don't NEED anything. No one in our family NEEDS anything. I want to give the girls something to open on Christmas morning, but in the back of my head, keep thinking they're gonna get so much stuff from everyone else. Why spend money on stuff that I'll probably toss in a few months? Avery wants a new bike. If we get Ave the bike, we need to get something big for McKenna too, right? We could get McKenna a dollhouse. We already have a dollhouse that Avery got when she turned 3. Where will we put another dollhouse? We need to get Presley something, but she doesn't need anything, but diapers and wipes. Do Kevin and I need to exchange gifts, just to show the kids that Santa didn't forget us? Kevin and I usually don't do gifts, just b/c all of the money goes to everyone else (there's 21 people in our 2 families). Do we buy stuff for each other for the girls' sake. Ugh, the thoughts in my head go on and on about stuff that doesn't even matter, long term. I guess I'm growing tired of buying stuff. Wow-never thought I'd say that. I'm tired of de-cluttering my house and throwing things away that we spent money on, then decided we didn't need (read-mostly the older girls' toys)
We didn't make it to Abilene today, hopefully tomorrow though. Didn't get as much school and laundry done yesterday, as I'd hoped. It's 11:30 and I'm still in my pjs, so today's not looking much better. Thank goodness, Avery's teacher can wear pjs to class!
3 comments:
Consider home-made food gifts. They're consumable, so there's not so much clutter. It's definitely from the heart. And, you can go as simple or elaborate as you choose. I found a recipe for truffles on the Kraftfoods.com web site!
Have fun in Abilene!
SaraB
You need to go to Craigslist! I just told Kevin about it! You might find something for McKenna there that is very cheap and she'll never know it isn't new! Also, does Presley just want diapers and wipes for xmas? Hope you have fun in Abilene!
This year we are cutting back on gifts in our family. Instead of buying presents for all our family (our parents, siblings and their spouses) we are buying for just our niece, nephews and our kids. This takes our gift list from 19 to 5 (my husband and I both come from divorced homes so we have LOTS of parents).
An idea I had, and granted, it's sounds really cheesy, is to put individual names on the tops of paper and have everyone at the family gathering write one nice thing about the person who's name is at the top of the paper. We did this in grade school and there is now a touching (albeit cheese-filled) story about something like that going around on the internet right now. But it's fun to write nice things about people and let them know how you feel in a tangible way and it's also really uplifting to see nice things about yourself.
My uncle had a brilliant idea too that he just did for my other uncle's birthday. He wrote a list of "What I learned from My Brother" and gave it to my uncle. Each item listed has a specific story behind it and made everyone remember good times. My mom's personal favorite was "How to drive our sister insane without even touching her!" LOL.
Anyway, I thought these ideas were much better than some trinket from a store and more meaningful. Plus, all it takes is the time, a computer and some paper.
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