3 Steps to Get Ready for Your Best Christmas

 

Christmas is a magical time of year, but it can also be overwhelming and stressful if you wait until the last minute to get ready. That’s why I’ve always advised friends and colleagues to get an early start! By getting a head start, you can enjoy a more relaxed and enjoyable holiday season. Here are three practical things you can do early to ensure that you enjoy your best Christmas!

1. Plan Your Holiday Budget

You can reduce holiday stress by planning your budget in advance. Start by listing all potential expenses, including gifts, decorations, holiday meals, and travel. This will help you set a realistic budget and avoid overspending.

• Create a Gift List: Write down everyone you plan to give gifts to and set a spending limit for each person. This will help you keep track of your expenses and avoid last-minute splurges.
• Track Your Spending: Use budgeting apps or a simple spreadsheet to monitor your expenses as you go. This can help you stay within your budget and make adjustments as needed. I have a free Holiday Spending Worksheet to share if you leave your request in the comments!

2. Start Gift Shopping Now

Gift shopping can be one of the most time-consuming aspects of Christmas preparation, so getting an early start can make a huge difference. As an added bonus, you’ll escape the crowds shopping in December. If you shop online, shopping early ensures gifts arriving in plenty of time. No more IOU’s for Christmas!

• Make a List: Outline what you plan to buy for each person. Consider their interests and hobbies to find thoughtful gifts.
• Shop Sales and Discounts: Take advantage of early holiday sales and special promotions to find great deals. Many retailers offer discounts well before the holiday season, so keep watch for them!

Starting your gift shopping early not only helps you avoid the last-minute rush but also allows you to find more meaningful and budget-friendly presents.

3. Prepare Your Home for the Festivities

Getting your home ready for Christmas early can make the season more enjoyable and less stressful. This includes decorating, organizing, and planning your holiday gatherings.

• Decorate Early: Put up your Christmas decorations in early December (or the day after Thanksgiving) to fully enjoy them throughout the season. I had a friend who had multiple trees for her house; she started decorating the beginning of November to avoid decorating burnout in December!
• Organize Holiday Supplies: Gather and check your holiday supplies, such as wrapping paper, ribbons, and greeting cards. This will prevent last-minute trips to the store and ensure you're fully prepared. In the coming year, consider shopping clearance sales after the holidays to stock up on your supplies!
• Plan Your Menu: If you're hosting holiday meals or taking dishes to other events, start planning your menu and creating a shopping list. This gives you ample time to try new recipes or adjust your plans based on dietary needs.

Starting your Christmas preparations early can transform the holiday season from a stressful time into a joyful one. By planning your budget, shopping for gifts, and getting your home ready, you’ll set the stage for a relaxing and festive Christmas. So, take a deep breath, get organized, and enjoy your best Christmas!

#5 - April: Your Christmas Stash and Items to Stock Up On

This month I want to focus on your Christmas “hiding place” and the things you can start filling it with. Do you have a place where you stash the gifts you make or buy throughout the year? Do you need a place to store materials for gift ideas? Without such a place, you probably hide things and then forget where you put them. One year it was two months AFTER Christmas when I found a big gift I’d gotten for my son. I’d hidden it behind a chair that sat behind my bedroom closet door that always remained open. He never looked there — but neither did I after I chose that as my hiding place!

Now I have an old, black metal, two-door supply cabinet with three shelves inside. It sits in my home office, where I spend most of my day. That’s where I stash gifts. My kids are old enough not to care what’s in there (or maybe they’ve never figured out what I keep in there besides old coloring books and boxes that once held office software), so I don’t lock it. If you have junior detectives in your house, you may want something that you can lock. Do you have a closet, cabinet, or shelf that you can use (and even disguise) as your Christmas storage? A solid color (not clear) plastic storage bin with alid is better than playing hide and seek for your gift stash. Having everything in the same place will save time later.

Now let’s turn our attention to items we can stock in our storage place. Gifts already bought or made are a given; any sewing supplies related to your gifts could be placed there, as well as any recipes that you’ve gathered for making a family cookbook. Maybe you are gathering supplies for making pretty soaps or candles. What else? This month we enjoyed the Easter holiday. What does that have to do with Christmas? Baskets are for sale now at clearance prices! If you want to make gift baskets for Christmas, stock up now. Easter grass is also on clearance and would make nifty packaging material in gift bags or boxes in place of tissue paper. You can also use the grass in clear plastic ornaments - hiding a small gift in the middle. What a pretty and unexpected surprise!

Some items may be readily available now but hard to find in the fall. Canning jars are such an item. One year I wanted to bake jar cakes as Christmas gifts, but I couldn’t find wide-mouth jars for sale anywhere in November! If you want to can homemade food items as gifts or make mix-in-a-jar gifts, now is a good time to pick up a supply of jars and stash them where you can find them. Don’t forget small jars to fill with bath salts or other homemade bath supplies as well.

Do you have a special place where you store your Christmas gifts and craft items? Share it here! This blog is set to post all comments, so feel free to comment, offer advice, or ask questions of your own.

#1 - January 2010!

From the Festival of Trees

Welcome to Christmas All Year Long—where getting ready for your favorite holiday is a year-long project!

What happens to you each December? Are you caught off guard by the many activities available? Do you participate in a mad scramble to make Christmas happen at your house—by baking and decorating and shopping and wrapping and caroling and partying and spinning in circles till you pass out? Do some of your plans turn to dust and blow away due to neglect? Then this is the place for you, my dear. We’re going to surprise everyone come December 1 by being prepared for the holiday season and having the time to enjoy it!

The idea is to focus on a holiday project each month. It won’t be time-consuming, and I’m pretty sure it will be fun. We will take one topic a month and see if we can’t make a better Christmas for ourselves, our families, and our friends.

Let’s kick off January with a two-part project. The first part is simple. Make a list of all the Christmas activities/projects you completed, and then list the things you wanted to do but ran out of time and energy for.

For example, this year I wrote a Christmas newsletter (at the last minute) and mailed out cards (at the last minute) and shopping for gifts (at the last minute). That’s not the way I like to do things, but that’s how it went. I also decorated the inside of my house, and I put up a few things outside, but I ran out of time and energy for putting out strings of lights. I made my traditional double-decker peanut butter fudge and the edible holly candy, but I ran out of time for cookies! I listened to lots of Christmas music, and I sang in my church’s Christmas choir. I went to one Christmas party thrown by the local Writers Guild at a restaurant, but I did not get to have friends over to my house as I’d hoped to do. I missed going to a live nativity, but I did take my family to the Festival of Trees for our yearly photo safari. We drove through one professional lights display, but we didn’t have time for the other, bigger one. I wanted to take my neighbors plates of Christmas goodies, but I didn’t get them made! I wanted to make some Christmas ornaments, but I haven’t had time to do that in several years, and the kits are getting quite dusty!

I didn’t accomplish nearly as much as I wanted to. But I also have to work at my job, get my allergy shots, and do my regular chores and errands as a single parent, plus help my teenager daughter with her school schedule and homework.

The only way I’m going to get all those things accomplished is to create a plan and follow it. So that’s what we’re going to do together! We’ll plan and work our way through the year so that our next Christmas will be the one we’ve always dreamed of! Make your lists now.

Part two: If you haven’t yet, take advantage of the after-Christmas clearance sales. You can get fabulous bargains at this time of year. Plus, it helps you plan in advance for next Christmas. As you stand in front of the wrapping paper, you can decide on a color scheme or theme for next year if the idea pleases you. Do you want to go with all metallic paper? Papers with penguins? Stripes, plaids, polka dots? All white paper with colored ribbon to accent the packages? Buy now, and you’ll have that chore out of the way. Get Christmas cards at 50-75% off the retail price. Plastic storage boxes are on sale at this time as well, so if you don’t have a place to store and protect your Christmas supplies, you can pick something up at a discount. I’ve already got my cards for next year, as well as some ribbons and small gift boxes, and I’m watching the sales for some outdoor decorations at bargain prices.

Future topics will include party planning, Christmas newsletters and photos, choosing and testing new recipes for Christmas goodies, music for the Big Day, decorating both indoors and out, shopping and/or making gifts, family fun activities, and more. Feel free to leave a comment with ideas for future topics.

Let’s keep the Spirit of Christmas alive all year long!