The Twelve Days of Christmas #12 - Simplify & Appreciate

Today's the first day of my Twelve Days of Christmas blog marathon. This is big folks. I've never posted twelve days in a row. Quite frankly, I was inspired to do this mostly for purely selfish reasons. Because, you see, this year I have found myself a bit overwhelmed by all of the Christmas brew-ha-ha that really has nothing to do with the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ, and at the same time a bit unimpressed by things that are supposed to invoke the spirit of the season. That leads me to...

Simplify and Appreciate the Little Things

Doug and I were reminiscing this weekend, as The Family Channel played Christmas show after Christmas show all weekend long. We were talking about how the Christmas Seasons of our childhoods were filled with so much anticipation. Topping that list, of course, were all those gifts under the tree and just sat there, day after day, torturing us...taunting us. Our wish lists were simple; mine came almost exclusively from hours of pouring over the Sears catalog, which was another anticipated event. Do any of you remember your excitement the day the Sears Christmas Catalog (not "Holiday Catalog") arrived in your mailbox?

There were a few holiday events to anticipate: the school Christmas (not "Holiday) chorus and band programs, the church Christmas program, maybe a neighborhood party or a family get-together. And this was a time to catch up on days or months of news. We certainly didn't have email to keep in contact daily (not that email is a bad thing) nor did we have the luxury of free long-distance phone calls. We didn't scurry from one party to the next every weekend in December, eating luke warm hors d'ourves while enduring yet another two hours with people we see every day at work.

We anticipated the one time a Christmas cartoon/show would come on TV, never imagining our children would have a choice of many different versions of Rudolph on 520 different channels beginning in October.

We spent all day Christmas Day and many days after actually playing with the toys we received. We knew who had given us the gifts and we wrote thank you notes.

So, after all the reminiscing, my husband and I decided the lesson in all of this was that we need to try to recapture a little bit of the simplicity. It shouldn't be about how many parties we're invited to, how many gifts we give the kids or how many other activities we can squeeze into the month. Maybe we could count how many dozen cookies we bake together (and eat!), or how many times Adam snatches that tiny little red bulb off the tree. Maybe we can count all of the family members and friends that are part of our life all year long, instead of just in a form letter once a year. And, quite possibly, many years from now, we will be counting our Christmas memories....almost too many to list.....none of which involve The Family Channel's cartoon line-up.

Until next time,

Jill