Simple Christmas

 My house isn’t decorated from top to bottom. My tree doesn’t have gifts spilling from beneath its branches. My baking hasn’t filled my freezer, nor have my plans to discover all the local Christmas hotspots come to fruition. I am not penning a mass Christmas card mail out, finishing my DIY candles for all my friends, taking H to see Santa at the mall, or signing up for additional volunteering.

Am I even celebrating Christmas at all, you might ask? Am I taking a hiatus? Am I boycotting all things Christmas? Not at all. I am making room to celebrate.

I am choosing to be present.

I am choosing not to absolutely hate December with its demands for performance, busyness, commercialism, consumerism, materialism and perfectionism. Yes, I am still busier than normal, but it comes with Joy (okay, some frenzy, but limited!). Oh, don’t get me wrong, I am lured day in and day out to buy-make-eat-covet-bake-decorate-do “more”, I am human after all. But, oh-me-oh-my I much prefer joy.

 What have I chosen?

• To study and reflect on Advent

(Note: My advent calendar for Dan and Hazel has sometimes been filled the night before. Next year, I will aim to gather trinkets and poems starting in October so that it will be complete by December!)

•  To decorate a Christmas tree
•  To send gifts to my family
•  To host Christmas brunch
•  To send Christmas cards to great grandmothers
•  To spend time with my hubby and daughter in the evenings
• To have fun making my own wrapping paper
•  To drink tea and Egg Nog (not together)
•  To nap (a lot)
• To live within my means (financially and physically)
• To laugh
• To listen to as much Christmas music as possible
• To choose Joy and Peace

My list may still be long or it may be relatively short compared to yours (I feel like I need to justify myself here and list every minute thing I have done like:  “wiped mashed carrots off the floor for the millionth time” …), but I am trying not to look at the grass on the other side. Mine is green enough.