This week, I paused to reflect on how incredibly quickly this Christmas season is passing.
I have heard it again and again from individuals this year. Christmas feels so rushed and sudden.
I’m sure it is the result of Thanksgiving being late in November. Or for me personally, the nature of experiencing my first Christmas season with four kids (including an infant under age one).
But whatever the reason, it is mindboggling to me that we are nine days away from the holiday already.
Robyn, Joy and I have continued our weekly Christmas celebrations this year. What started as “Christmas Saturdays” with elaborate food and Christmas movies morphed into “Christmas Thursdays” last year since our weekends were jam packed. This year, it’s really “Christmas whenever we can squeeze it in” as we’ve met on a Saturday, a Thursday, and a Friday thus far!
The first week, we made chocolate bark with the kids with various toppings so the kids could create their custom bark (crushed cookies, candies, nuts, coconut, etc). The second week, we had fresh snow, so the kids played for a while outside. And last week, Joy prepped simple sugar cookies with canned frosting and sprinkles.
So far, we’ve only watched one movie (part of The Grinch), and the kids have mostly argued with one another (as kids who spend a lot of time together often do!). But we’re carrying on the tradition.
Meanwhile, on the home front, we’ve had our challenges as well.
It seemed that nearly every Christmas light malfunctioned or didn’t work when we initially decorated around the house. The ripple effect was that we didn’t finish setting up decor for ten days and our holiday storage bins only made it back into storage yesterday. I joked that we were putting the bins away right in time to take them back down!
We’ve had some challenge-free fun, though, too!
Gingerbread houses were so fun to build again this year, and I got in on the action as well.
We baked our holiday cookies (or at least some of them so far) and my grandma’s fudge, though I scaled the recipes back so we wouldn’t have hundreds of treats.
And I was able to assemble care packages for the homeless in our community. (a service activity I did with my kids back in 2022 but never completed last year). Thank God for curbside pick-up, which made this activity much easier to complete as I ordered all the supplies from my phone late one night and just picked them up.
If you’re interested in making something similar, here’s what I included:
- Socks
- Applesauce cups (with a spoon)
- Granola bars
- Hot Hand warmers
- Toothbrush, toothpaste, flossers
- Tissues
- Hand sanitizer wipes
- Lip balm
I packed everything in a gallon-size zip top bag and stored them in my car for easy distribution as we drive around town this holiday season.
More fun is yet to come, and maybe I’ll remember to take some photos from our final “Christmas Saturday” or other holiday festivities. I’m going to try to slow down and soak in the last nine days as we drink cocoa, view Christmas lights, watch holiday movies, and most importantly, enjoy one another’s company.