Here are some posts that I put together last year about Getting Ready for the Holidays, maybe they can help you have a less stressful holiday season this year. I will update posts as I change things but they may give you a starting point.
We’ve had a busy weekend… well, I have. I’ve been working on my pantry makeover and I’ve completely moved things around 3 times already! I will post pictures as soon as I have it the way I like it but it is an improvement already and I think it makes better use of the breakfast nook space that just didn’t work for us.
I’ve mentioned in several posts about my Holiday Planning Binder but I don’t know if I’ve ever really shared what it looks like. It’s definitely nothing fancy… just an old Trapper Keeper that the kiddos didn’t use and the folders are old pocket folders that they aren’t using. I really like that it zips up because it helps to keep everything contained really well and prevents the inevitable spillage that happens when you have kiddos running around.
This is what the outside of the planner looks like… nothing special at all but the fact that it is purple helps me to identify it from other binders on the shelf and I can tell almost anyone to grab me the purple binder and they have no trouble finding it all. I probably should’ve tried to clean it up a bit before the pictures but this is how LIFE goes around here and these smudges and smears remind me of all the little blessings that are running through my house!
Last week I posted about some of the things we are doing to help prepare our homes for the holidays and hopefully prevent a little of the CHAOS. We will continue to review those things and work on a few more things this week.
As we do our weekly ‘Home Blessings’ we will continue to look for things that don’t belong and get them put away where they belong or get rid of things we don’t really need.
We will sit down and discuss where and when we will be having dinners and get-togethers as well as menu ideas so we can begin preparing those grocery lists! We like to have a special breakfast for St. Nicholas day and something special for Christmas morning plus we have some favorite desserts and cookies that we make around the holidays so we need to make sure that we add all of those things to our list. We may even try out a few new recipes beforehand to make sure that we like them.
If we plan to do any Black Friday shopping we will start making plans of where to go and with whom but this isn’t something I usually participate in. I may try to do a little ‘Cyber Monday’ shopping but who knows?
I’ll try to make a few freezer meals so that we have them for busy days during the holiday season as well as make a list of desserts, like pumpkin rolls, and things that can be made ahead of time and put in the freezer… these may also make great gifts!
I also need to check over our calendars as we have a lot of birthdays and special occasions that we don’t want to forget in the hustle and bustle of the holiday season.
I will review and mail order items that we want to purchase and try to get them crossed off the list so that they will have plenty of time to get here before the holiday rush arrives. It’s not fun when your ‘perfect’ gift idea doesn’t arrive because it was back ordered or delayed for some unforeseen reason. By ordering early you will have time to prepare if the unforeseen happens.
I will review the menu lists in my Holiday Planner so I can find a few things to add to my weekly grocery list as well as checking to make sure that we have plenty of the everyday essentials like toilet paper and paper towels because we don’t want to run out of those things when we have guests.
We will decide what other gift ideas (and budget amounts) we may have in mind or if we would rather do a gift exchange for other family members… money is tight this year so we will be looking at some creative ideas that we can use to make sure everyone gets a little something.We may try to have a potluck on Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner to help with the cost of thingsor we may have a cookie exchange along with the Polar Express to help provide a few extra snacks for the kiddos.
Life is crazy enough without adding holiday stress to it. The simpler we can keep things, the better in most cases and we are always trying to find creative solutions to things we need to get done. By spending just a few minutes a day working on these tasks it helps to get us prepared without causing a lot of unnecessary stress.
Is it ever too early to think about Christmas? Probably not, especially when you consider all of the extra things that happen during that busy season. We just got everything decorated for Fall… I think this might be the first year we have really decorated this house as I kept waiting until we had everything ‘just right’ but who knows when that will be, so we might as well try to make things a little nicer today.
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