Christmas in July

When my children were young, I would start Christmas shopping in July.  

I wanted to be finished before Thanksgiving, including all wrapping.  

If I accomplished this it would take the stress out of the holiday.  

We could listen to Christmas music, watch the tree lights, snuggle, decorate cookies and just have fun.  

(That's my story and I'm sticking to it!)

I would begin by brainstorming and making a list.  I had categories for gifts that were in place since that first Christmas when Lexy was born.  The categories included a doll/stuffed animal, jewelry, educational toy, toy, music, book, sister gift, a big Santa gift and stocking stuffers.  If it didn't fit into the specific categories it became a stocking stuffer, sometimes sitting beside the stockings in a pile.  

It was all too much!

I also needed to find the "perfect" ornament for each daughter.  It needed to be meaningful and identify something from their year.  Oh, and there was also the Christmas Eve video and pajamas too.  Dennis usually had to work on Christmas Eve day and to make our day easier to handle "Santa" left a video on the tree to occupy time and reduce the "When is Daddy coming home?" questions.  We would snuggle in with popcorn and make it a celebration.  After Christmas Eve dinner was the annual pajama gift, to start the winding down of the evening and get ready for the Reindeer Food sprinkling.   A lot of these traditions evolved and then were gone.  The video tradition was deleted when there was so much arguing over what video they wanted that there had to be two. 

It was all too much!

The decorating has also become less and less and last year there was none, not even a wreath or table centerpiece.  No one wanted to sit and watch the tree lights or even help put on the decorations anymore.  We would remember to do the advent calendar every few days.  It became my "job" only.  I do miss the Christmas tree smell.  

It was all too much!

Presents evolved also.  No more categories.  We moved onto drawing names for the 4 of us and had a limit of $25.00.  We have now gone to no gifts or stockings at all.  We started our "no gifts for our family" tradition by sending holiday boxes to Marines serving our country.  It was my daughters' idea to said send some more boxes and don't do gifts for our family so that became a tradition.  The last few years we have donated gifts to the UC Davis Children's hospital.  It is fun and we help so many sick children.  We love doing this together and will continue this tradition. We are finished with our shopping before Thanksgiving and don't wrap anything.  

Christmas in July is part of my Right Size project.  I am going through all our Christmas boxes and passing on what we don't want or use which is most of it. However, I won't be giving away the stockings (I really like the stocking tradition! HINT! HINT! It could make a comeback this year?).  There are stuffed animals, books, advent calendars, santa plates, santas, decorations and so much more.  

How much is enough?  

What do I really want to keep? 

But as you know, all these "things" don't make Christmas.  

Christmas lives in our hearts all year long.  

It is a season of love and giving. 

As I go through boxes and decide what goes and what stays, I will be reminiscing.  

I will be reliving those fun moments.

  

I am thankful that we have those special memories. 

I am thankful that we have kept some of the traditions. 

I am even more thankful we have evolved and changed our traditions to fit the family we are now. 

Are you happy with your 

Christmas season 

and traditions?

Do you need to release traditions 

that aren't working anymore?

What can you embrace to make it a special year?

I wish you love and peace during this Christmas in July "right size" project time.  

I won't be sending cards!