Our Love Hate relationship with Christmas

In our house we have a love hate relationship with Christmas, my husband hates it, and everyone else loves it:)  Since Bob works in retail Christmas to him means long hours, busy days and lots of stressed out customers and just a lot of work in general.  He gets tired of hearing Christmas music (which is piped in overhead constantly while he is working) and in general looks at Christmas as just a lot of extra work.  The commercialism of Christmas has worn him down, his favorite Christmas movie is "How the Grinch stole Christmas"

The rest of us, however, LOVE Christmas and all the happiness and joy that comes with it.  There are a lot of extra things I do at Christmas, but I pretty much enjoy them all.  Everyone is so full of love and kindess and giving and willingness to help others out, it is great.

 This year, since we will be spending it at Greg's house we went minimal with the Christmas tree, we have an artificial one that is pre-lit, and there will be no outside lights or extra decorations.   When the kids were little I used to force them out for hours looking for the right Christmas tree. Some years we went to stores, others to farms and sometimes to the local lot.  It was a family activity with a lot of memories.  I swore I would never have an artificial tree.  Then I bought one, wow!  Michael and I put it up in an hour then we were able to relax and enjoy each others company, what a difference!  The smell isn't the same, but I think I can find some freshener for that, I don't plan on going back to a real tree, ever!

Michael and I started on Candy Making and he is going to have a bunch of his friends over in the morning to help me finish...it's time for the traditional plate of Northrup candy, if I missed you let me know and I will make sure you get some!  I sure as heck don't need to eat all the leftovers.  Bob doesn't make candy,but I know he loves eating it.

I had a blast doing black Friday shopping with Kevin and Michael last week, we started at 3am that day and were shocked by how many people were up and at it, but that is completed,  and there is something exhilarating about knowing I got a really good deal on the presents I bought.  Yeah!  feels great, I can relax and not worry about gifts.  I do keep a few small extra wrapped presents around, just in case I missed someone.  Bob was involved with black Friday too...just on the other end.

Next is the Christmas cards, or should I say letter.  It is kind of cliche, but it lets everyone in our life know what is going on (because very few of them read my blog), and I think it is a little more personal than just a card. 

Another thing I love is the music, I need to did out my Manheim Steamroller Christmas CD, but as I mentioned above, I can only listen when Bob isn't around, so I think I'll put it in my car.

Finally, my very favorite Christmas tradition, pretty much the only Christmas tradition Bob loves too, acting out the Christmas story, since the children got older we went to just reading it, instead of acting it out.  When they were little we had to go through it 5 times so everyone would get to play every part.  It was a lot of fun.  This year we will be with our grandsons, and so I will get to see it actually acted out again.  I am so excited for that! 

That's my Christmas for this year, yeah, there is still work and school, but I plan to enjoy all the excitement up til Christmas and I am counting the days til we are all together again as a family for Christmas.  I hope you get to spend it with family and have a great one too!