December

 

I have to start off by saying that my December posts will be less than in previous years. We're in the process of moving into an apartment following the sale of our home. Until our new house is done in February, we'll be living in a 2-bedroom apartment. I usually work on my December posts in the Fall, but this year I just haven't been able to.

I'll be reading your posts, and commenting and am looking forward to the inspiration I always get from you this time of year!

November!

 

November! For most of you this means much cooler temps and beautiful Fall colors. Maybe even some snow flurries. For me it means temps in the low 80s and nights in the 50s. It's sleeping with the windows open weather!

This months list is kinda strange to me. 

20. I'm not sure where you can get a free Thanksgiving turkey/Christmas Ham. A better idea would be to donate a free turkey/ham to someone less fortunate.

21. This one I can get into. We took an oddball photo for our Christmas cards this year. I'm not sure that I'm really brave enough to send it out. We'll see.

22. I don't really "do" Amazon. I like to buy stuff that I can touch. That being said, my daughter has a Prime account and let's me use it if I do need to buy something online.

23. In Arizona, you can apply for a permit to cut a tree. But to be honest, the areas they open up for cutting are not very pretty.

24. This is a great tip. It's never to early to start planning your December activities.

25. I have no idea what KCL is. But shopping Black Friday sales can be fun!

 

Hmm, as I read this month's list I realize that none of it applies to me. I don't use Shutterfly, Snapfish, or Vistaprint. We don't "do" holiday pj's. I don't typically make Halloween themed Christmas decor. And I don't give Halloween candy as stocking stuffers.

What I will be doing this month is:

1. Order Christmas postcards.

2. Begin writing annual Christmas letter.

3. Shop at Hobby Lobby every week. If I don't, everything sells out before I get a chance at it! Our Hobby Lobby has had Christmas out for weeks and the shelves empty as fast as they can fill them.

4. Start my Christmas Baking list, buy ingredients each week.

I'm almost done with my Christmas shopping. With all of the uncertainty in our lives with the new house and our current house being on the market, I'm trying to get everything done so I'm ready to face whatever comes my way. Since I don't even know where I'll be living for Christmas, I don't plan on decorating. If I can, it'll definitely be last minute! I'm feeling good about my progress toward a stress-free Christmas...

 

Here we are... another month closer to Christmas!

 11) I am busy stitching away on Christmas stockings for my DIL's nieces. I have decided which craft the Grands will make their parents for this year. 

12) I don't drink wine, but this one made me laugh!

13) I have an advent calendar system I made for the Grands a few years ago, but won't use it this year as we're in the process of selling house.

14) Now this I will do. I tried it last year and it worked great!

15) I only have four more people out of my little family of 14 to buy for. The rest is bought, wrapped, and stored temporarily in a closet.

How're your Christmas preparations coming along? 

Christmas Time's a'Comin'🎅

I'm not sure why this list of tips promotes so many retailers, but you can ignore that and still get some good ideas for a stress-free Christmas. 

August is not too early to start to plan. When it was just the six of us in our little family, I started Christmas gift shopping in May. It was the start of our family birthday season and a good time to collect wish lists from our kids.

Although our family birthday season has grown to be year round (except for April and November) I still keep up the tradition of starting to ask for wish lists in May. Most of my adult kids give me wish lists all year long, which I love!

Another thing I generally do in August is to begin planning for family Christmas events. I make lists of food I might serve, goodies I might make, and games we might play. The lists start out pretty long, but I whittle them down as the holidays approach.

This month I'm going to choose my Christmas postcard and focus on getting the right photos to use. I'm also going to start a draft annual Christmas letter.

What are you going to do to achieve a stress-free Christmas?

July 3rd

 The secret to a great Christmas is to be organized... EARLY. If you've read my blog, you know that I developed a great organizational system for my family. It's worked for me for over 20 years. There are a variety of systems out there. You just have to find the one that works for you, tweak it for your family's specific traditions, and you'll be on your way to a stress-free Christmas. 

Not everyone wants to start planning for the holidays in July. There are many ideas for starting in September, November, or even December 1st. The key is to pick out the best suggestions from a variety of sources and make them your own. Here's a few examples to start. (from Pinterest)

Christmas in July 7.23.2021

 

What do we want? A stress-free holiday. When do we want it? NOW!

I'm not obsessed with Christmas, but I do dedicate a little bit of time thinking about it all year. My goal every year is to be completely done with shopping/wrapping by Thanksgiving. To have all of my baking done by December 10th. And to be able to be present for whatever opportunities come my way during the Season.

Some years I do better than others!

I have my own fool-proof organizational plan that works for me. It is not carved in stone and I make adjustments to it as needed. I'm always on the lookout for ideas that I can incorporate into my plan.

Want a stress-free Christmas? Let's get started today.

The secret to success with any organizational plan is to adapt it to your lifestyle, your needs, your family. For instance, I don't have Kindle or Alexa, so obviously I'm not stocking up on Amazon Prime Day. (I don't have Amazon Prime, either). But I can adapt that suggestion to my life, in fact I already have. I stocked up on toys during Walmart/Target huge toy sales the past week or so.

I don't use the Santa's Bag app, but I do have a Christmas gift app that I keep on my phone. It is very helpful.

I use suggestion #4 also. We stock up on office supplies, stocking stuffers AND Easter basket items during the back-to-school sales.

Whatever method you use, now is the time to be thinking of the upcoming holiday season.

Christmas in July 7.20.2021

 

As I mentioned yesterday, I got quite a bit Christmas shopping done this past weekend. Ya gotta love sales! 

If you've read my blog at all, you know that I have a fool-proof (for me) organizational system for the Holidays. In keeping with my system, I wrapped and tagged the gifts yesterday.

I have 20 people in my immediate family to give gifts to this year. I am completely finished with one grandchild. And have a good start on several other people. One down, 19 to go! It's such a good feeling to have a start toward a stress-free Christmas.

Christmas Time's a'Comin'

 Oh boy! Only two months to go until Christmas Day! 

Have you been working toward a stress-free Christmas? I have. If ever we needed less stress this is the year. I've finished shopping for several people in my family. I have prepared my Family Christmas menu and my Christmas Day menu. I've wrapped all the gifts I've purchased to this point. And I'm finished with stocking stuffers for half the family.

This year has been chaotic at my house. My daughter and her two kids moved in on February 1st. She's having a house built and should get the keys on November 10th. We knew they would be living here for several months, but we had no idea that the virus was coming.

The kids school closed down March 13th and we began the awful, horrible, ridiculous, stressful, inadequate process of distance learning. It was really a joke for the rest of that school year. We survived Grammy's Summer Camp with virtually no activities. Thank goodness we have a swimming pool. Then began distance learning for the new school year. It is somewhat improved, but still incredibly stressful. My daughter works for a company that contracts with DCS, and is responsible for 150+ kids living in 18 group homes. She was working 12+ hour days for several months so the kids schooling fell to me. I felt (and feel) so inadequate.

Plus our house is stuffed to the brim with our stuff, their stuff, the stuff she's buying for the new house. I joke that I live in a warehouse.

Now Christmas is coming. The photo above shows my storage option this year for purchased/wrapped gifts. It's not great, but it works! 

I wish I could start decorating on November 1st, but with so much stuff in the house, there's no way. She will start moving on November 13th and I hope to start decorating with a vengeance that weekend!

I have managed to make and freeze 18 dozen Peanut clusters, 10 dozen Cashew clusters, and two Pistachio Bread loaves, so I feel good about that.

Hope you're making progress on having a stress-free Holiday Season!

Christmas Time's a'Comin'

 Time is flyin' by! I have "Fall Fever", a serious case of it and began decorating the house for Fall this week. Even though the temps are hovering around 115 degrees.

And you know what comes after Fall... Christmas!

I'm busy buying and wrapping gifts. This year I'm using gift boxes and gift bags for all of the presents. This past weekend I managed to wrap gifts and fill stockings with stuffers.

This year I'm using a new method for the stocking. In the past I used gift sacks and put each person's stuffers in their sack, filling the stockings the night before Family Christmas. It worked... for a while. But the past few years as the Grands got older I often bought stuffers that were too large for the stockings. 

So this year, I'm using the Hallmark bags like the one below. I have one bag per family. I put the stuffers in the stockings and then set them in the bag for their family. So far, so good! I discovered yesterday that I'm done with one grandchild using this method. All of the stockings are slightly different sizes, but I use a number limit on stocking stuffers (based on the age of the recipient.) The adults get the same amount, but the one year old gets less than the 11 year old.

I had to laugh yesterday when we Skyped with our family in KS. I could see that my DIL had started decorating for Fall. I commented on it and she said "yes, I just NEED a change". I completely agree with her. I can't control much about my life right now, but I CAN control my environment!

Christmas in July Day Two

Sometime last year I was looking for ideas on Pinterest and I stumbled across these organizational images for the holidays. I started trying to track them all down and save them. It was harder than I thought it would be. I still haven't found all of them, but decided to utilize the ones I do have in my CIJ posts for 2020. So here we go...

I really like this tip. When I first read it I thought "well, of course, I always plan around my priorities". But as I kept coming back to it I realized that's not necessarily true. So I started thinking about my priorities when it comes to the holiday season. My priorities are to have time to spend with my family and to be organized enough that the holiday season is as stress-free as I can make it.

Now that I know my priorities I've started thinking about the "traditions" or things I try to do every year and grading them on how they match my priorities. Some of them match, some of them don't. So this year I'm hoping to make some hard choices about what to keep and what to delete in my Christmas planning and celebration. 

I'll let you know how this goes...

Christmas Time's a'Comin'

Christmas 2019 was so fun-filled at our house that I'm wondering what Christmas 2020 will bring!

In the month since Christmas I have re-organized my Christmas storage, purchased a few stocking stuffers, a couple of new decor pieces and started a list of what I'm hoping the holiday season will look like.

I purchased this at At Home, I'm not sure exactly what I'll do with it, but I think it could have many uses.

This was a gift I received from my kids...

... and so is this sweet Santa!

Each year I set up a "Christmas Corner" on a bookcase outside of our bedroom. Here is this year's collection:

As I've gotten older it's hard for me to manhandle large tubs from the garage into the house for Christmas decorating. Over the past few years I've downsized (in storage containers, not in stuff) to smaller tubs and boxes that are not too heavy for me. I store most of the ornaments, beads, garland, stockings, nativities, and linens inside my bedroom closet. I use decorative boxes which are pretty and festive for me to look at all year around! We store the trees, outside decorations, and oversize decor in the garage. We don't have to worry about humidity here, but we do have excessive heat in the summer and that's also a part of why I've moved to indoor storage on some items.

From an organizational standpoint, I've created my stocking stuffer chart and my family gift chart. I'm already on the lookout for awesome stocking stuffers (especially for men, why are they so difficult?) I won't get really into gift buying until May. And of course, once Hobby Lobby starts putting out Christmas in June I'll start to get really excited!

Christmas in July: Day 30

I've begun a new "tradition" the past few years. As Christmas in July comes to a close, I prepare meals from our pantry and freezer to clear them out.

If you're like me, you stock up on staples that go on sale throughout the year. Next thing I know I have way too many cans of soup, green beans, and pounds of frozen ground beef.

Now is the time to eat your way through those items to make room for the supplies you'll need for holiday meals and baking.

The added benefit is that when your pantry and freezer are practically empty they're easy to clean!

By the time September rolls around I'll be ready to start stocking supplies for Fall and Winter holidays as well as family events.

For me, it's a good way to transition from the first part of the year to the last.

Inspiration to organize my pantry

Christmas in July: Day 27

This is the time of year that I really start to get excited for the holidays. The kids are (almost) back in school, the grandkid birthday season has come to an end for this year, the weather is getting cooler (well, not really, that won't happen until October for us!). My thoughts turn more and more to Christmas.

I've felt restless and unorganized the past few years when it comes to the holidays. I finally decided last year that it was caused by me planning the holidays for a family of 10, when we've grown to a family of 16. 

This year I'm reorganizing in some areas, getting rid of some traditions that no longer work for us, and planning a fresh look by changing up my decor.

I spend a few minutes each day dreaming of what I want it to look like this year. Then I jot down some notes to be revisited in November.

One thing I'm very aware of is that I don't need to buy any Christmas decor. I have tons and I'm eager to see how I can re-purpose some of it. I believe that everything old can seem new again!

As Christmas in July draws to a close where are you in your Christmas planning? Have you made decisions this month that you'll implement in December? 

CIJ: The ABCs of Christmas ~Freedom

Freedom. You may think this is an odd word to use in a Christmas post. But I'm talking about freedom from stress in your holiday celebrations. I promise you it is possible. But of course, it takes effort and planning to pull it off.

In 1994, I was working at my church. We decided to launch a new Christmas event called "A Christmas Journey" which would include "building" the town of Bethlehem and other locations from the Christmas story and running performances for two weekends. As the administrative assistant for the Programming Department which was responsible for this event I realized that I would have to be ready for my family Christmas early.

This was the beginning of my goal to have a stress-free Christmas. It's now 24 years later (how is that even possible?) and I have to say that I'm pleased with the results. Most years I do achieve a stress-free Christmas. Once in a while I fail. But, I'm always ready to try again the next year.

Here are my top ten tips for FREEDOM during the Holiday Season.
Starting today!

1. Make a budget. This keeps us from going overboard and facing huge credit card bills in January!
2. Make a planner. You can use an old spiral notebook, an app on your phone, the free printables from Organized Christmas, or whatever method works for you. Your planner should include a calendar, budget sheet, shopping lists, purchased lists, menu planner, Christmas card list, etc.
3. Make wish lists. Ask your family/friends what they want for Christmas. If you've never done this before it may feel awkward, but trust me, it's not as awkward as giving someone a gift they don't want.
4. Schedule special events. Grab your calendar and start thinking about the special events you want to participate in this year and get them scheduled. This includes family Christmas, school programs, church programs, local events; you name it! If you want to attend it, schedule it.
5. Christmas cards. Let's face it, they're dying. But I love them. If you love them too, it's not too early to start your card list. Now is the time to start thinking about your annual letter if you write one.
6. Start shopping! I shop for Christmas year around. Especially for stocking stuffers. My adult kids give me their Christmas wish lists in May. I save the youngest grands for last because their interests can change so quickly. Shopping early is a big help in sticking to a budget.
7. Baking. I try to sit down in July and think about the goodies I want to make for the holiday season. I gather the recipes in one spot so I can find them in November when I start baking. In September, I start buying the ingredients needed.
8. Decor. Look at photos from Christmas past and think about your decor. Do you want it to be the same? Do you want to change things up? Organized Christmas has a great worksheet for planning your decor for each room of your home.
9. Take care of yourself. I know, we always think of ourselves last.We feel uncomfortable stating our desires and wishes to others. We're so busy doing that we don't take time for being. It's time to break that cycle! Write down your Christmas wish list for your family. If you have to tell them exactly where to buy it, or take a picture of it - do it! I've even been known to buy gifts for myself, give them to my husband to wrap, just to be sure I got what I really wanted!
10. Relax. What doesn't get done, doesn't get done. It's not a contest. No one is grading you. If some element of your usual Christmas tradition stresses you out, discontinue it, give it over to someone else in the family, or re-design it to work better for you. As our families grow up and grow in size, it's ok to drop old traditions so we can pick up new ones.

Let's make this the most stress-free holiday season ever!

December First - More Fun, Less Stress

It's not too late. You can still do it. You can have a stress-free Christmas.

By spending time each day this week on Christmas, you can be ready to relax and enjoy the fun for the three weeks preceding Christmas.

Are you ready? Let's go!

12/1 - Sit down with your favorite Christmas beverage and make a list of who you want to buy gifts for, what you want to buy, and how much you want to spend. If it's on your phone - great! - you'll have it with you at all times. If it's on paper - awesome! - fold it up and put it in your purse.

12/2 - Time to go shopping. Yes, I know it's a Saturday. The stores will be crowded, the mall will be packed. That's just the reality of preparing for Christmas in December. Next year you'll be done with all of this by Thanksgiving, so this is the last year you have to endure the craziness! Take a few minutes before heading out the door to look over the list you made yesterday. Try to plan your day to get as many gifts as possible in the same location. You can do it!

12/3 - Today is baking day. Don't overwhelm yourself. Choose three of your favorite traditional holiday goodies and prepare them. If your family has a tendency to eat them up quickly, freeze half of them or hide them in your pantry so they last the entire holiday season.

 12/4 - Take time today to put your tree up and decorate the interior of your house. Again, just put out the decor that you really like. It's ok to leave some decor in the boxes. You can bring those pieces out next year when you have more time to decorate.
  12/5 - Now that your tree is up, it's time to wrap the gifts. I have learned over the years that although I want the gifts to be wrapped in awesome, never~before~seen~at~my~house styles, the recipients could care less what the gifts look like. Some of my kids don't even use bows/ribbons on the gifts for their families. Don't stress about what the gift wrap looks like.

12/6 - Today is the day to wrap up the loose ends you haven't gotten to. If you normally send Christmas cards, why not try something different this year? In this day of technology, it's perfectly acceptable to send e-cards or e-mails. I've even received cute text Christmas greetings. Save the cards for next year.

12/7 - Pat yourself on the back. You're ready for Christmas. You may not be doing everything you normally do each year, but that's ok. It's good to shake things up from time to time. The most important thing is that you're ready to enjoy the activities, concerts, school programs, and family fun that's about to happen this season.

Congratulations! I'm proud of you. You're ready for a stress-free Holiday!

Stress-free Christmas: Holiday Grand Plan

I'm always on the lookout for a good organizational plan to share for a stress-free Christmas and today I've found one! Thanks to Pamela over at The Lady of the House Speaking for sharing a link to the Holiday Grand Plan.

It looks like an easy plan with lots of free printables and suggestions for a stress-free holiday season. The plan officially started yesterday, but you're not too late to join in.

 Please let me know if you start this plan, I'd enjoy hearing how it works for you!

Christmas in July: Day Twenty One - Organize

In 1994 I worked for our church in the programming department. We decided to create a Christmas program that would run for three weekends before Christmas in an outdoor venue. It was called "A Christmas Journey" and was a recreation of the village of Bethlehem. As you can imagine, this endeavor called for hundreds of volunteers. I was the person that organized the volunteers.

I quickly realized that I would need to be organized in my own little family Christmas as well. I started working on a chart to keep track of my personal shopping, budget, etc.

As the years went by ("A Christmas Journey" grew to involve literally thousands of volunteers, a village that we built from the ground up, and included food vendors and local performers by the time our last performance was held in 2000) I kept tweaking my chart until I came up with the final version that worked for me. It really does work for me because I've been using it for more than 20 years!

It is extremely simple. I list the names of each family member at the top of a column. For the grandkids, there is a four gift limit. The yellow rows are for stocking stuffers.

I shop for Christmas year around so I will create my 2018 chart on 12/26/17. As I buy a gift I write it on the chart along with the $ amount. When I wrap it I highlight it. When I've reached the budget amount for each person, I stop buying for them!

Now that there are so many people in our family, I've started keeping the charts as an easy guide to what I've purchased for them in past years. It keeps me from buying the same Pig themed kitchen utensils for Jessica year after year, haha!

When I buy gifts I bring them home and wrap them. I also affix the gift tag. I then store them in tubs in the closet until Thanksgiving. The day after Thanksgiving I get all of the gifts out and put ribbons and bows on them and under the tree they go.

As you can imagine, by the time I pull them out at Thanksgiving I have no idea what is in each package. This is where my list is a life-saver. I don't have to know what's in them, because I know from my list what I've wrapped.

I feel like I've used a lot of words to try to explain what really is a simple method. 

There are also several holiday organizing sites on-line. I recommend Organized Christmas. The site provides printables, advice, a countdown plan, and much more.

I also must tell you that for the past two years I have used a free app on my phone to keep track of my purchases. It's definitely secondary to my chart, but it does come in handy.

I'm always on the lookout for new organizing ideas, do you have a great Holiday organization tip to share?

Christmas in July: Day Six - Budget

Ugh, budgets. Who wants to talk about budgets?

No one. Not even me.

But, having a budget is a critical part of having a stress-free Christmas season. And it can be easier than it sounds.

In 1994 when I decided that I had to get organized about Christmas due to work obligations, I quickly realized that having a budge was a big part of organization. I set my budget in May of that year and also determined to spend cash as much as possible.

Since I was beginning my Christmas buying so early the cash part was actually pretty painless. I tried to stick to my plan of purchasing one Christmas gift per week starting in May. The success of that first year motivated me to do even better the second year, third year, and so on. By now it's a habit that's ingrained in me.

My budget does not stay the same each year. It changes based on our financial ability to purchase gifts. Some years it's a really healthy amount, other years it's dismal. Just like real life!

I found some cool Christmas budget savings methods on Pinterest. I haven't tried any of these... yet. I think next year I'm going to incorporate one of them into my organizational system.

If you try one, let me know how it works out for you. At the very least, grab a cold drink, sit down with a paper (or your tablet or your phone) and make a budget for Christmas 2017. You'll be glad you did!

       
   

Christmas Time's a'Comin'

Easter is over. I'm decorating my house for the summer months which means my Patriotic decor. And my thoughts are turning toward Christmas.

I'm laying out a plan for my Christmas in July posts. I'm hoping to come up with some interesting new ideas this year. Hope being the operative word!

On my last visit to Hobby Lobby they seemed to have most of their Patriotic decor out on the floor. You know what that means... Fall and Christmas boxes will start appearing on the tops of the shelves sometime before June 1st!

I'm stitching away on the stockings I need to make this year. And I do mean need. I'm committed to stitching six stockings and I'm only about 2/3 through the first one. I'm trying desperately not to get discouraged at this early stage.

On the positive front, my Christmas gift shopping is going well. I have a couple of gifts for one of my daughters and bought a grandson's large gift already. We're re-doing our closet so I plan to have a gift corner in it to help with storage. With 14 in our immediate family and 21 of us including the extended family storage is becoming a real challenge!