Ready, Set, Go
Yesterday was the 6 week mark.Six weeks until Christmas.
Are you finished your shopping yet? Have you started?
Are you sick of Christmas Carols yet? Have you heard one?
I am both one foot in and one foot out on the Christmas countdown.
Part of me wants to live one holiday at a time. One blessed, singularly focused moment in time. No distractions, no mixed messages, no shove it down your throats on September 6th because we have to pack, pack, pack it in.
And part of me is worried that it's already over. That we're turning the page on 2015 and we haven't had a quiet Christmas moment. Made a memory. Captured the faces on every family member and imprinted them on our hearts.
We missed Halloween. I mean, we 'celebrated' Halloween but we never got a pumpkin. There was just never any time to do it the way we wanted to -- to load up and go pumpkin picking. So we never got one. First year ever. Ever. In my 44 years this was the first time it just never got it done.
Thanksgiving will be completely non-traditional this year. For one thing, we'll be in sunny Florida. And while I know that they celebrate Thanksgiving in the warmest places of the USA, it's just not going to be something with which I am familiar.
So that's two traditions down, one to go before we flip the calendar page on 2015, and the last chance I have to make a memory for my soon to be teenager and my soon to be 10 year old.
I keep thinking that at some point a routine will set in. That we'll do something 'every year' because we've done it every year. But, it always seems that we're just catching up, just running ragged, just getting by with what we can pull off before the holiday has passed.
I want my kids to appreciate the essence of Christmas. The spirit of Christmas. The peace of Christmas. I just don't know how to fit that in to the ADHD, crazy, overscheduled, overcommitted world that we exist in. There's never enough time to do all we want, see all we want, be all we want.
This Christmas, the only thing I want under the tree is 30 minutes with my family. Where no one has anywhere to be or anything to do. Where we sit together and stare at the tree and give thanks for what we have. What we have that isn't material, battery operated, made in China.
I have 6 weeks to figure out how to pull that off. All I want for Christmas is time.
