.. and all through the house, there was unwrapped presents and mess every where and a child with a fat lip and another telling you all about how she will ride her horsey on you till you get out of bed, and you need to come up with something for dinner and find out if there are clean clothes for everyone to wear tomorrow since it is going to be much colder than planned and you still can’t figure out what is eating all your veggie garden….
I have sort of forgotten it is Christmas Eve! It doesn’t feel much like it… and as much as this will sound so scroogey I am sort of over the lead up to Christmas and just want it to be here already! Mind you I still have a couple of presents to wrap and I still haven’t made up my mind on that Santa dilemma!
I think this year has been the year to reflect on so many things and Christmas is just one of them.
We’ve just marked a year since my FIL died which I think has put an even more difficult spin on Christmas this year than it did last year when it was just days after his death. Another friend has just lost her father and is dealing with the major ripples that seems to create this close to a major family celebration. (think of you!) Perhaps this time of the year just makes you think more about family and how you deal with them? Perhaps you decide to give more or less of yourself or it just makes you realise how far the ripples you create permeate the world?
I am slowly getting my head around how I’d like to celebrate Christmas with my family. As much as I love the memories of my own childhood Christmases I think I’ve come to see that I can’t duplicate that for my children even if I wanted to (and I am not sure I do entirely.. not that they weren’t great Mum and Dad if you are reading!). And that it would be even better to build their own magical Christmas memories…. so that is where I am heading!
I love this comment that Leah left on my Santa dilemma post
‘For me part of Christmas is to impart that the world is a fine and generous place – I know how consumeristic it seems to say that Christmas is about abundance. But really, this is one of the main things for me, that there is a whole day set aside for family, there is special and plentiful food, special decorations, there is special attention, and special presents shared … I remember the feeling of being so lucky on Christmas day, I really think it can contribute to an optimistic outlook on life. It’s easy to feel grateful when you feel truly blessed…’
This just hit home with me… it was like a little light being turned on and I could finally make my way through the consumer craziness and find something positive and real without falling over all the crap on the way!
Since the wise Leah left me that comment the girls and I have been having some great conversations about presents.. about how on Christmas Day and then Boxing Day we will give people we love presents… and mostly presents we made for them. The thought of giving special people in their lives something special – something they would perhaps dearly love themselves, on a special day seems to have really hit home with the girls.
Instead of the few presents under our tree being a temptation for them (I still can’t believe they haven’t unwrapped them!) they have become much more about anticipation and the girls asking who they are from. Uncle M bought up presents for the girls on Friday and we put them under the tree… Izzy asked me yesterday ‘did M and Auntie C go and buy them specially for us???’.
Suddenly the whole present things seems like less of a commercial and social push to buy the most expensive and most perfect present and more about someone taking time to give something special for someone they love. I love that idea! Leah you are so wise!
So I am still out to lunch on the Santa thing. It is mostly the ‘who gave the presents’ issue that bothers me at the moment. So .. do I tell a small lie and say I didn’t buy the presents? Or can I convince myself it is just imparting the magic of Christmas and not a white lie at all… I am still not sure… I guess I am hoping they just won’t ask this year so I have more time to decide for next year!
The girls don’t talk about Santa much anyway – they recognise the commercial figures of Santa but I don’t think they expect him specifically to bring them presents…. so perhaps I am off the hook for now. Until we get to my parents place that is, and everyone there asks them if Santa came to their house.. lucky I will have a diversion in that Zoe will be mortified to think that Scary Santa was in her house and will climb into my clothing and give me a handy excuse to ask people not to bring up that subject again.
So Christmas Eve it is…. bring on Christmas Day!
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