Christmas 2011

I love and adore and cherish and LOVE Christmas! I love the atmosphere, I love that a higher percentage of strangers I meet throughout the month of December are friendly and cheerful. I love giving gifts more than anything!

(I love a lot of things)  

I love thinking about what I want to buy for a person.

I love researching the best one of whatever it is

 I love shopping for the most inexpensive one

I love wrapping it beautifully and uniquely

I love the anticipation of giving it to them

I love the look on their face when they open it

I Love Lucy!

The point is, I love Christmas and Christmas presents

But...

I've decided to give Christmas a little change-up this year.

Normally I buy our daughter Aly a "~.B.~"-"~.I.~"-"~.G.~" gift (for our financial means that's about $200-400) and then a bunch of smaller ones. The small ones are usually things I think she'd like and usually some books or video games, and of course the Christmas pajamas she is allowed to open and wear on Christmas Eve.

I've (we've) always done this because I grew up with very little. I would not change that if I could, I have learned so many valuable lessons living as we did, but I was determined from the day of Aly's birth to give her the things in childhood I wished I had. The problem is that I wished those things as a child, I didn't experience them, and so I did give them to her as finances allowed. She is not a spoiled brat as most would determine one, but she is spoiled in the way that she has material expectations at a level that's not okay. I know I created that, I take full responsibility, but now I have the responsibility of changing it. I don't want her to carry those expectations into adulthood. Now please don't read out of that, that I've given in to all of her requests or even most of them, I haven't. I have also always instilled in her a sense of empathy and sympathy for others and she regularly donates clothes and toys from her room on her own. She is a great kid and I'm very proud of her, I just don't like the amount of material expectations she has.

So....

Oh Christmas Tree
Oh Christmas Tree
This year you'll be so lonelyyyyyyyyy

I've heard somewhere about this little tradition and I'm going to implement it starting this year. We will buy Aly stocking stuffers but as far as the "under the tree" gifts go, we will buy her only four.

One that she WANTS

One that she NEEDS

One that she can WEAR

One that she can READ

My husband and I talked to her about this the other night and it went very well. We try to come across as including her rather than forcing her and it went great! It was SO great that she immediately got a paper out and starting listing things in each category, discussing them with us from time to time. I made sure to let her know that we would try to get one off of each list but that we might choose something different altogether and she was very happy with that because she was working toward the outcome WITH us. We reassured her (her biggest worry) that our decision to start this tradition would not affect anyone else in our extended family and that they could get her whatever THEY wanted to get her.

We also had a small bit of a "Is Santa Real?" conversation, her and I.
She asked if he would bring her presents also.
I told her yes, one or two of the four will be from Santa.
She asked, "How do you know? How can you talk to him?"

(I will do anything I can to never lie to my daughter. I will twist words and I will distract, but I won't lie)

I said, "I cannot tell you that. That is only something you will know when you're a parent."
She asked, "Well is he real?"
Ahhhh... at this point I was really wracking my brain so I put on my thinking face and I told her, "Well, that depends. He is real if you believe he is real. If you believe he exists, he will be real for you, and you will get a present from him. If you don't believe he exists, he will NOT exist for you and you will not get a present from Santa."

She thought about this for a minute and asked if he was a real person. I took this as "Did a real person named Santa ever exist and magically fly around in a sleigh and play with elves?" and I told her my honest answer, that I didn't know.

She asked, "Do YOU believe in Santa, mom?"

and I said, "Yes honey. I do." Because I do. I believe in the spirit of Santa Claus. Sometimes less is more and allows me to not lie or over complicate things. I don't like to leave her unsatisfied with a question and so I waited a bit, she sort of nodded to herself and that was it! It was a tough question I had no answer for until I opened my mouth.

It was a wonderful Milestone Mommy Moment <3