Happy Holidays from Larissa Spafford Designs!!!! Enter the coupon code HappyHolidays15 during checkout in my Etsy shop to receive a 15% discount.
Every year around the holidays, for pretty much both of my son's lives, I have been busy with craft fairs. This usually results in doing almost nothing to get ready for Christmas at our house until after the last craft fair. The last craft fair usually happens the Saturday before Christmas. There is always last minute Christmas tree shopping & decorating, and last minute gift shopping too. This year I was feeling pretty on top of it because we went and got our tree BEFORE we left town for the last craft fair. We put it in our garage and it was waiting for us when we returned home on Wednesday. We also began picking up a few things for the boys stocking stuffers way back at the beginning of Dec. when we were at the One of a Kind Show in Chicago. That is record breaking early for us.
For me Christmas is about being together & celebrating, not just about giving gifts. I love, love, love to give gifts, but I really want the boys to grow up knowing that Christmas is about more than gifts. But they are kids, and presents really are what they seem to care about most. Kai was about to hyperventilate a few minutes ago because he can't wait until tonight when we told him he can open one present.
Last night we had planned to have a few friends & family members over for dinner and then decorate our tree. Our plans changed when our friends car broke down on the way over and Robbie went to pick them up and take them back home. By the time Robbie got them home to Eugene he was tired and decided to stay the night. I wanted us to all decorate the tree together, so I told the boys that we would have to wait one more day to decorate. They didn't really go for the wait one more day idea, and one was crying and they were both saying how Christmas was ruined and how it did not feel like Christmas time at all. Great. I explained that traditionally people did decorate their trees on Christmas Eve. They did not care....one bit. When I asked them what we could do to make it feel more Christmas like they didn't have any ideas. Even greater.
We ended up having our own little party, just the three of us. I turned on some Christmas music, Kai made popcorn, and they drank eggnog. We got the tree out of the garage and into the living room and temporarily decorated it with some candy canes. Then we got out the art supplies and made wrapping paper for my nieces presents. After a while they were both SO happy and said it did feel like Christmas. I was one relieved & happy mommy, and I feel like Christmas to them IS about more than just receiving gifts :)
