December 1st - Here I come!

This year when I heard the first Christmas ads immediately following Remembrance Day, I cringed. I am a December 1st kind-of-girl. I like to wait until the month that Christmas is in before I turn on my lights or decorate my house.


That's not to say I am not thinking about Christmas before December 1st. In fact, I think about it ALOT before in terms of gifts and planning. We have quite a few birthdays in December, so on top of all of the Christmas gifts we buy, I need to be on top of all things gifts in order to maintain my sanity. I also like to know how I am going to spend Christmas - where we are going and how long we will spend there, so November is filled with emails and phone calls trying to coordinate everyone's schedule. Christmas is on my mind, but not in my house, I guess.

Yesterday morning on my way to work the house on the corner of our crescent caught my eye. It had its outdoor lights on and their tree had lit up their whole front window. It looked beautiful. For the first time this season I got excited. Thanks Charma ;-)

Until this point Christmas felt like a job. It is one of the biggest events of the year and in our house I am the event planner. I have spent most of November consumed with purchasing gifts and organizing our schedule. This morning Christmas felt like a holiday. I got excited for the excitement. I couldn't wait to bake cookies, decorate our house, drink hot chocolate, play Christmas carols, light candles, go to parties, and curl up beside our fireplace with my honey.

Glennis over at Momastary wrote a great piece about how her family celebrates the season. Read it! Among other things, she talks about getting all her shopping done by December 1st so that the Christmas season can truly be about what it is meant to be. I don't know about you, but battling crowds and the stress of finding the perfect gift is not what Christmas is about to me. In fact, it causes my heart to shrink 3 sizes, and as a result I turn immediately into the Grinch. Needless to say, I couldn't agree with Glennis's post more!

In fact, I am so on board with her approach that some of my enthusiasm has transfered to Hugh. A couple of days ago I heard him announce to a friend that, "We are almost done our Christmas shopping!"

To clarify: What he meant by that was, "Jordan has created a comprehensive list of all the people we need to purchase presents for and followed that by brainstorming ideas. Jordan has then been spending a ton of her free time scouring the internet looking for and purchasing the perfect gifts for our loved ones. Jordan has also hit a few stores around the city to nab a the gifts that couldn't be purchased online. On top of that Jordan found a sitter for this Friday night so that we can finish up her entire list by the weekend."
Just a note: Hugh will be doing his part of the "We are almost done our Christmas shopping" when he pays my credit card bill from our account!

I am am pumped for December 1st, which fittingly falls on a Saturday this year. I am going to wake up and have a cup of coffee while Hugh hauls up my Christmas decorations. Thanks in advance, honey! I am going to crank the Christmas tunes (I love Michael Buble "Christmas") and start the part of Christmas I love.

If this December 1st approach sounds good to you, you still have a few days to knock some gifts off of your list. My top online shopping hits this year were Chapters (toys and books), The Gap & Old Navy,  ebay, Fat Brain Toys, and Etsy (sort of like the ebay of homemade). Good luck and happy shopping!

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