Decorations going up!!

When I was younger I used to try and do all of Christmas things in the month of December.  Often I'm a slow learner.  December is chock full of wonderful festive celebratory things like: choirs, plays, RS, Ward parties, BookClub, VT.  Things to attend to.  Things to go to.  Things to help with.  Visiting family to get ready for.  Stake Sec. RSP assignments to do. Sister's birthday.  Having plates of goodies ready for those who give you plates of goodies. How many should I make up?  Dr. Appointments- Terry's ears.  My dreaded oral surgery!!  Gifts to buy and mail or making the decision as to what to do about that.  Son's wedding anniversary. Feeding the Missionaries and sending something to our Grandson Missionary/Ward Missionaries.  What to cook and what to buy and when to buy it.  Shopping for friends.  Haircut. Daughter's birthday.  Gift for Missionaries.  Decorating the house- inside and outside!  Did I mention cleaning the house like a frenzied fool?  I mentally contemplate all sorts of candlelit dinner parties.  evening gowns?  boas?  whatever! 

Used to be.... in this, desperately needing Prozac or it's kin moment,  is exactly when I decide to make everyone I've known since grade school, a quilt + home made fudge + WW bread.  And of course, I don't want my family left out,  all 22 members of my immediate family will get the same thing!  I just get totally ridiculous and then feign innocence like...oh, Christmas is on the calendar.  again?  So soon?  Really? 

All of this mentally scrambling in my brain is fragmenting my wild thoughts like a bomb went off!

Wearing myself out with stress, hyperventilating to the point of carrying a lunch sack in my purse!, inwardly swearing on a stack of Bibles that I'll never ever delay like this again.  Even knowing it's wrong to even think about the swearing, I can't help myself.  

Perhaps it was the day I realized that I was not enjoying Christmas that made me rethink it all.  I thought about my personal creed and a couple of points hit home....Nothing changes if nothing changes and also Einstein saying... the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

At that time frame of my life, I was also very co-dependent and wanted to help everyone to be happy and merry and jolly.  I felt their enjoyment depended on my actions. 

No more.

Now I absolutely love Christmas and the entire process.  From the day after Thanksgiving to Dec. 1st is the time we decorate.  There are just the two of us so we are very free!  We do as we please.  And quite love it!  We don't move or work fast but we are on schedule to have the inside and outside done by Saturday, Dec.1st.  We will teamwork, piecework it together and it will be just as we want it!

We like an inside tree and an outside tree.  We no longer use a "real" tree.  They just got homelier and more expensive and didn't stay as fresh plus they dropped their needles.  We enjoy our 2 trees.

Here is my clever man, inventor extraordinaire, using his pulley system to get our inside house tree down from it's rafter repose.  A collapsed tree, with a pump, that extends tall.  then we fan the branches and finish decorating beyond what came on the tree.

Clever man!!

working his system!

Yes...that is our tree!

Just you wait and see what happens!

I told you so!!  All pumped up!!

Here is our outdoor tree.  for you to enjoy when you drive by!

It's old but still shines!

Fixing lights that are being temperamental!!

I wish I'd known about planning to enjoy Christmas years before I figured it out!!  It's all about giving and sharing and doing and thinking, all the time/over and over, about the Savior and His goodness and that He is the light of the world and the light of my life.  Wishing to give to Him but instead giving and sharing with others- my love of Him.  I needed a plan to carry out my heart's desire!  It's in motion!  Decorations going up!!!