1. I don’t know where our tree is.
2. I haven’t finished shopping.
3. No Christmas cards this year.
4. Turtle the elf barely remembered to make an appearance today and he is NOT clever or inventive. He was sitting in a chair. 🙂
5. I haven’t dug out the Christmas decor.
6. I only did the title page of my December Daily and (I’ll share soon) and I didn’t take a picture at all today.
7. I don’t know where our 25 Christmas books are (they are spread all over the house) and I certainly didn’t wrap them this year.
8. No creative Advent calendar- though we did get a cute Lego one.
9. I have not a clue what I’m doing for teacher gifts.
10. I probably won’t do any Christmas baking this year because my Italian oven stinks.
And yet…we are together. And I couldn’t ask for anything more.
As for the rest? Well…
Here’s to doing it the half-assed way. WOOOHOOO! Happy December!!
Love this and love your photo above. Here’s to just doing what you can! We put too much pressure on ourselves when what’s really important? You’re all together!
Oh my goodness, thank you!
I promised my daughter I would do the wrapped daily book thing again this year like last year. She loved it!
I totally forgot to wrap the books.
Still time before she gets home from school though now, so this post saved me 🙂
And I am telling you my new relaxed mentality about what actually happens for Christmas this year as opposed to what the perfect Christmas should be, is helping a lot. But I did promise her the books!
We were going to go to our off site storage where we keep our Christmas stuff (trees, decorations, everything) this past weekend. Unfortunately, my husband was called out of town for work the day after Thanksgiving, so it’s been put off until next weekend when he’s back. I hope. Oh well, the kids and I bought a pretty new wreath at Target for the door and it got us into the spirit. 🙂
Xcode what’s best for you and your lovely family!
Lovely family photo!
I love the reality posts like this…and I love how you are doing this all as a family, together!!
I asked my kids if they wanted to do the wrapped Christmas books this year like we did last year (they loved it last year)….and they were both like “um…nah, no thanks”. Psh, so much for that! and I think I have done a Christmas card ONCE in the 10 years Greg and I have been married….
Together is the best December prep of all! Things aren’t looking much better here. I tore my achilles this summer & life suddenly got hard. But Thursday is my last day of therapy & I just walked about 1/4 of mile. Let me tell you it felt wonderful! So the tree is up but no decorations. No cards, no baking this year but we are going home in 2 weeks!
Don’t sweat the small stuff Stephanie, don’t make things hard for yourself, just have an easy, relaxed happy Christmas with your peeps. The rest of it doesn’t matter in the slightest. Wishing you a very enjoyable December. CJ xx
I call that the fun way! December is stressful enough without Dobson extra ways to make it harder. Enjoy it!
Sounds like the really important stuff is covered! Enjoy! Blessings to you and your family.
ha! half assed is my favorite kind of holiday! woot!
We’re team semi-half assed here. We’ll roll with it. Happy holidays to you.
Honest and awesome!
You got it exactly right. Family is the most important thing!
Beautiful, beautiful photo…..”Here here to half-assed Christmases…”….Amen, lady, Amen…
None of what you said seemed in the least bit to be half-assed. Sounded like real life. We can’t always live in a Pinterest world. Have a glass of wine, and remember how much your children already love you.
I wish your comment section had a “Like” button. 🙂
Photoshop a tree between the two benches in the above photo — print — instant and awesome Christmas card.
I hear you. My tree is up with lights and ribbon and a few decorations on it everything else is spread all over the living room floor in boxes and bins. For. the. past. week. ugh. It looks like I’ll get to it Thursday…? I haven’t sent cards in at least 5 years and have thus stopped receiving any. You are absolutely right though, family is all that matters. And omg Harper looks exactly like you here!
Your honesty makes me feel so much more normal. Thank you!!!!!
So good to hear reality, always makes me feel better! You know what is important and I am sure your family will have a great Christmas! I love your pictures. Thank you!!!
Love this! I’m organizing a huge ladies’ event at my church this week, so we are not doing Christmas cards this year and I only put out half of our decorations. Good for you!
Hey-that sounds like my life right now!
I love this list! I decided to wrap up the Christmas books this year…and the two year old could care less. He opens one and chucks it! Overrated! Lol!!
Hey Stephanie, I was so half-assed this year that I didn’t even put up a tree. But when your nest is empty and no one is coming home, spending a couple of days putting stuff out to only be put away a few weeks later seemed silly. I pulled out my Christmas candles and greenery and called it complete. Then when my daughter said she was coming home for what amounted to 36 hours, I decided not to sweat it. We spent all of Christmas Eve day together just doing what made us both happy. I didn’t make special cookies or goodies or properly decorate, but we thoroughly enjoyed each other’s company. The craziness of perfect holidays is overrated and doesn’t ever really happen. Our perfect holiday is when we just enjoy the time and reflect. Of course, all this is coming several days too late. The holidays are almost totally over. But there’so always next year to choose. Do we rule the holiday or does it rule us? I love your family, Stephanie. And yes, you’re going to love the German Christmas markets. I can’t wait to relive my visit to christkindle market through your pics. Happy New Year!