Christmas Day is in exactly 1 week! I can never believe how fast this last month before Christmas flies by! This year I think it has gone even faster now that I am at home with Peyton. All of a sudden last Friday I realized that we would be opening presents with both Mark's parents and my parents in less than a week and a half...and we hadn't bought anything yet! Both of our families follow similar traditions, instead of buying everyone something, we pick names and just buy the person's who's name we have picked a present. This helps to keep the budget realistic and allows you to put lots of time and thought into the present for your person.
With Mark's family they decided to throw a little twist by adding the stipulation that the present you buy must start with the first letter of your person's first name (so the person who picked Mark must buy him something that starts with the letter 'm'). This makes it a little tricky, but adds an element of fun to our gift giving night. We lucked out with the names that we picked - we have to buy a 'j' present and a 't' present. The funny thing is...as Mark and I thought about the presents and walked through the mall we couldn't think of a single 't' present! Haha! Probably the easiest name to have picked and the easiest letter to have to use: t-shirt, toque, travel mug, tea...you get the idea. The things we could think of at the time? Turtle, tiara, tights, tarantula, toad, titanium...once again, you get the idea! All in all it was a fun exercise and I hope that our two people like what we finally purchased - and nope...it wasn't a tarantula!
With my family we do something a little different. Instead of putting a restraint on what you can buy, we appeal to everyone's creative side (or lack there of). Everyone must write a poem for their person. This poem can be about anything...well, anything, as long as it somehow refers to your person. The poems add a lot of fun to our gift giving evening. They get lots of laughs and help to make the evening not just about the gifts. I have to admit though, poetry writing is not one of mine or Mark's top skills! We are often sitting downstairs at my parents house still trying to put something creative (and rhyming!) onto paper minutes before our evening starts. This year I hope to try to finish our poems before getting to my parent's house...especially since we have never had to try to schedule our poetry writing around an unpredictable child:). My dad and mom are great poem writers - its always so fun to hear theirs!
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| Decorating P's first Christmas tree! |
On another note, I haven't had much trouble getting into the Christmas mood for our own little family's celebration! We decorated our tree the first weekend of December (the Grinch Mark won't let us decorate or listen to Christmas music before December 1st). At first we decided that we weren't going to go 'all out' for P's first Christmas as she will only be 13ish weeks. Then I started shopping and have had a hard time stopping! Its so fun to buy little toys and imagine her using them as she keeps learning new things. We bought her a couple of "grabbing" toys (toys that are easy for her to grab!) because this past week she has started to grab at things around her. I am still not sure that she fully is aware or understands that she is grabbing...but in the next couple of weeks she will start doing it more fluidly and now we will have "grabbing" toys for her! Also, in the next month (or so) she can start to use her Bumbo chair (her neck's getting stronger!) and play with toys sitting up! I am so excited to actually play with her! Needless to say, as we started thinking of these big milestones coming up...we started shopping and well, we might have gone a little overboard. My favorite purchase(s) so far are the bath toys we bought her. She already loves her bath, but I can't wait for her to actually play during bath time once she is able to sit up!
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| The glass ball that we bought at Bronner's Christmas Store during our 'babymoon' in Michigan! So special! |
This evening I left Mark at home with P and tried to escape to finish my last minute shopping. I had attempted to go out on Friday afternoon but the mall was sooooooooo busy and I started to be a little scared for my life! Its hard maneuvering a big stroller through crowded stores without people getting slightly annoyed! I finally realized that it wasn't going to happen on Friday (after driving over the fifth (or more) person). I escaped for an hour and a half tonight but it was slightly overwhelming. I hadn't been sure I would be able to get away and, when Mark finally succeeded in pushing me out the door, I realized I wasn't prepared. I arrived at the mall without a list or a clear idea of what I was looking for or for who I was buying. I wandered around feeling slightly overwhelmed. I also had forgotten my glasses at home...and well, I don't function well half-blind (don't ask how I got to and from the mall...there was some guessing involved :s). I wandered through the mall bumping into other overwhelmed, confused shoppers just like myself (mostly men to my embarrassment!). Anyways, after wandering around for about an hour I realized that my time would be better spent at home with my upset child (evenings aren't our best time around here). I headed home with a few purchases (not nearly everything I needed). Of course, of those few purchases, three of them were for P that I hadn't counted on or expected to purchase...oops! So, *sigh*, tomorrow I will swallow my fear and head out in the morning with both P and a list and *hopefully* I will be able to finish my Christmas shopping without running over *too many* other shoppers! Happy shopping to me!
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| The finished product with the presents for everyone underneath :)! It looks better in real life with the lights on! |
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