For the past two years I have done the bare minimum to prepare and decorate for Christmas. I didn’t decorate every room in the house – in fact, I only brought two boxes of decorations down from the attic this year. I didn’t bake and bake – in fact, I didn’t bake at all. I bought a few things from my small town bakery and my future daughter-in-law provided the rest. I didn’t shop and shop I spent ONE day shopping in real life and the rest I did online.
And you know what?
No one died from it.
No one complained.
In fact, I don’t think anyone even commented on it.
You know what happened in stead?
I was relaxed and content. I wasn’t exhausted (except for recovering from radiation) and I wasn’t overwhelmed.
I enjoyed the holiday as much as everyone else. I ate good food that I let the kids help prepare or bring with them. I cuddled on the sofa with my grandlittle and pups and I let others do some of the things that needed doing.
It was divine and I highly recommend it!
I may not do it every year but the last two years it was what I NEEDED to do for myself and everything turned out just fine. Maybe even better than fine.
What do you think? Do you think you could let go a little bit so that YOU could enjoy yourself some too or is it something that you could never do?
I truly believe that “less is more” in most cases. As I get older I’ve learned to let go and try to focus on the more important things. I still love our family traditions and large family gatherings, but with the “less is more” attitude. Less time in the kitchen and more time to visit and play games is great!
Thanks for the different perspectives.
I let go a quarter of a century ago. We bake one batch of cookies, get ourselves what we want, and finally started enjoying this time of the year. Get well soon and have a happy new year.
Gail, I’m up for everything except buying my own presents. I’m still a 12 year old girl at heart and I love getting presents. 🙂
Happy New Year!! V
Same here. We usually do Thanksgiving, my Christmas Eve birthday and Christmas Day at my house. Not the past two years! And, you know, all is well. We were all together, laughed alot ate what we had to eat- and our tree is only 1/2 decorated!???????? The bottom justdidn’t
get done. The lights were beautiful and so was Christmas.
Funny how easy it is to let things go Suzanne. There are some things we hold on to for dear life and then something happens and we realize it just wasn’t that important after all. I’m glad you enjoyed your beautiful lights and I hope your Christmas was a joy. xoxo V
A great idea to share the responsibilities for food – and decorations and all the prep for big family gatherings. It shows that you expect and respect the contributions of your adult kids. When that happened in my family, we “kids” stepped up and it was a milestone and rite of passage for us. It truly felt like we were being seen as adults. Happy Holidays to you and your whole beautiful family!
Ah, I’m glad you shared that perspective Carol. It makes me feel less guilty for asking for help. 😉
xoxo