The interesting thing about putting your personal goals into a blog posting, is that people actually hold you accountable. For the past few days I have received numerous e-mails and calls to see if I actually did what I said I was going to do, and stop all “holidaymaker work” on the 13th. I would love to say yes. I would love to say that I am a completely reformed obsessive compulsive holidaymaker. But the sad answer is no. Last night I stayed up writing out Christmas cards until 11:30. Today I went to the mall and the post office. My five year old told me yesterday that getting ready for Christmas is worst than moving. (An experience we all barely survived three months ago.) So here I am 4 days after my deadline and I am still doing all the “stuff” that I think I need to do. I feel guilty about it. Partly because I set a goal of making the season Christ centered and I am still running around like a chicken with my head cut off. But mostly, I feel badly because I am not making this season fun for my kids. Sure we have made cookies, cards and gifts. We have driven around and looked at lights and had devotions at night. But we haven’t had fun yet. I have to admit that as much as I want to get off the treadmill of commercial Christmas frenzy – I have had a really hard time actually doing it. My mother actually shouted at me the other day “YOU ARE OUT OF CONTROL!” She’s right.
Luckily tomorrow I am being shoved off the Holidaymaker treadmill. Tomorrow morning my family heads out on our annual pilgrimage to the Bahamas to spend Christmas with my grandmother. So whatever I can’t get done tonight, will have to wait until January. There are no malls, no post offices, no Walmarts to run to “just one more time.” There is just a beach, four generations of my family and 21 days stretching ahead of us.
It is time to stop the cards, and candies, and shopping and running around. It is time to focus on what actually matters to me - my husband, my children, my extended family, and the coming birth of my Lord and Savior. It is time to have some fun.
