Last Christmas, I was 5 weeks postpartum and flapping about everything and anything, getting ready to host 2 babies, a 3 year old and 6 adults for Christmas lunch. This year wasn’t so different… we had 6 adults and 2 babies, except I wasn’t flapping!
I do think hosting really saved my sanity last year, it gave me something that wasn’t Baby Wright to focus on… but I also tried to do far too much in such a short space of time.
This year I vowed to do things very differently, and the top tip I can give you is reflections. I struggled to plan last year as I wasn’t sure when baby would make her appearance, what I’d be able to do, and I didn’t get started anywhere near as early as I should have because we were trying to finish the renovations in time for her arrival. I seriously underestimated how newborns sleep and feed, and left myself with FAR too much to do when I should have been resting. I didn’t delegate, and I didn’t scale back my expectations until far too late. I got upset, I got rescued (as always) by my husband.
This year I’m writing to you with a whole new relaxed state of mind. I had all my gifts in, my food shop was done (minus a few bits of fresh produce that won’t keep) before the 15th Dec, and I wrapped AROUND my baby’s routine (which is still very unpredictable) – everything was wrapped by the 23rd which is my usually wrapping day, and it was an entirely different and calm experience. There is still some things I’d change, some beyond my control and some within it so let’s delve in!
Christmas Reflections 2024!
Well, I’ve already started to get ahead!
Time and feeling pressured was still my number one issue this year, even though I was well ahead and held a good buffer but I’m still conscious I wasn’t able to relax into the Christmas spirit. Maybe that was the pressure of Christmas magic or maybe it was how late I felt I did my shopping this year.
I’ve been thinking about how I can get even further ahead, by doing some things now before I even put Christmas away, by making and organising things ahead.
Next I’ve been thinking about when I’d like to be done with the ‘last minute’ things, so when would be a good time to start.
For next year, I’ve already opened a savings account, and I’ve deposited cashback from TopCashBack from buying this years gifts, and money from selling our unwanted things, I’m going to use this as a foundation to pay for Christmas moving forward with some regular top ups. Becoming a parent has really changed my money mindset, and I feel like I need to be more prepared for our future with ‘pots’ and savings as opposed to living life as it comes from one big savings pot.
I’m thinking about my christmas crackers… they get left to the last minute every year and they irritate me something rotten. We make our own because we don’t like the waste of shop bought ones… I’ve still not made this years, we bought some in the end and we forgot about them. My fillers for this years crackers have only just arrived today, but I could not only make next years but make some in bulk so they’re ready for the future before I put my craft box away. They’ve been a last minute rush every year since I decided to start making my own… I started because my sister hates waste and to be homest its a nice tradition but its very time consuming. So I think moving forward they’re going to be part of my post christmas clean up. I can make them ahead and forget about them, and feel grateful they’re almost done (except for a fresh choccy) and put them on the table without stress.
I’m thinking about our advent traditions… this year I left this very late to think about as it was Amelia’s birthday and Christening but now we have our wishlist set, I can already start timeblocking for 2025. We’ve written some new activities for our wish list so I’m going to get this typed up and printed, popping this in the advent sleigh for next year ready to go.
I’m also thinking of doing a book advent, and we have quite a lot of Christmas books I bought that Amelia won’t remember, didn’t read and wont understand so if I can find a couple more in the sales or in charity shops I’ll be able to wrap those ready and pop them in the sleigh.
I’m thinking about Christmas magic… how I have 8 or 9 more years to fill with the best memories and adventures, and how this translates to her understanding and our future planning. We’ve written ourselves some goals like Iceland, Disney, and Lapland for when Amelia is a bit older and we’ll start plotting how old we think is appropriate to take her. Theres also some local activities like Keilder, Adventure Valley, Whitehouse Farm, Beamish that we could go to as well. I’ve already signed up to find out when visits to Santa open for booking too and will pencil in a date with my friend so we’re ready to book.
I’m thinking about our gifts… what we buy, when we buy, who we buy, the impact that has on the clutter of everyones lives, how we put away the gifts we got ourselves.
Funding Christmas was chaos this year because I’d been on SMP and unpaid leave, so I organised bought and paid for everything as soon as I got my first pay. Normally (and as an accountant) this is not my style at all but we’ve winged our way financially all year because I just couldn’t face thinking about it, and luckily we had such a good system in place it saw us through without much intervention.
Honestly, I’ve found the volume of presents for Amelia within 6 weeks of the year very overwhelming, and asking for things that will suit her all year. I think next year we’ll ask for gift vouchers for her birthday and presents for now for Christmas, then buy things as she needs then in the summer.
For our shopping, I feel like I need to do that in October/November and minimise what I buy and wrap them earlier so I don’t have that looming over me while I’m trying to enjoy Christmas. I also need to think about where we store them because she will gradually start to understand, whereas this year her gifts were hidden in plain site in her own bedroom. Can’t do that next year, haha! I also think I want to focus more on gifting experiences, everyone I talk to was overwhelmed by gifts toys and clutter, some people even saidntheir children still have wrapped or boxed gifts and I can’t help but think our gifts were part of a consumerism trap that we could get out of. We were quite good this year and did buy a lot of gift cards and vouchers butbI still think we have more we can do.
I’m thinking about Christmas cards… we donate a meal each to the homeless, send a text message to the masses (which I forgot to do this year, doh!) and order a very small number of personalised cards for close family. Usually I deposit a small amount all year into funky pigeon prepay so that we build up credit and get more for our money, and I bulk buy our cards quarterly to make the most of the discounts but I’m looking for a cheaper option for cards in general next year, and I’m hoping to order the family cards much sooner. We’ll still donate the meal to the homeless, and we’ll schedule to send our text message to wider family much sooner next year so I don’t forget like this year (sorry family!).
I’m thinking about my Christmas planner… and actually my yearly planner, how shop bought don’t really serve me, and what I can do to make them better. After swearing I wouldn’t buy one, I also bought myself a planner for 2025. I’ve taken some inspiration from things I’ve used over the years and things I’ve seen online to start mocking myself something up for next year already using the notes app in my phone and Canva. I’ve ordered a hole punch and empty a5 binder to try making my own Christmas tracker and 2026 planner.
I’m thinking about how my decorations and crafts are organised in the loft… and how they could be better arranged to help me out next year. I’m going to have a sort through and get rid of a lot of things we haven’t used this year, and I’m going to reorganise the boxes so that they’re by room and date we need them even if that means buying some new boxes. For example the table settings were boxed with my kitchen decorations so they were up and down from the loft and really we could organise them a lot better; this was never really a problem in the past because Christmas just came down from the loft and sat in the spare room but now thats Amelia’s bedroom we don’t have the luxury of spare space.
I’m also thinking about what went well, the gift bags I made for last year were perfect – I bought matching Christmas shopping bags from Tesco the year before on boxing day for something like 10p each and used my cricut to add names for everyone on my family, then collected them back in after xmas. These bags have worked incredibly well, they still look brand new and they have saved us a fortune already.
What else will I do differently?
First things first, booking time off needs to be a priority. We not only have Amelia and Ted to think about, but ourselves as a family. We need some time to enjoy and reset, so thats my first job when I go back to work.
I think I might even take a day off to get organised when Amelia is at day care of so I can just crack on and be ready, and if I’m already I can use the day to relax. It feels a bit selfish but also I really feel like I need it to feel relaxed going into Christmas.
Timings… I need to be a month ahead of where I was this year, so I can enjoy the magic too. I’ve made myself a list of all traditions and I’m hoping to start in October getting everything ready ahead of Amelia’s birthday. I’m going to block out some weekends for Christmas crafts in November and to just check through what we have.
Lunch… I’ve hosted 2 years in a row now so I’ve told the family it is someone elses turn next year, and I think for us it will be chaos with Amelia walking so I already feel a big relief about not hosting.
Chrostmas eve… we totally forgot about a treats for santa plate so I’ve made myself a tick sheet, it felt like I had so much to remember, we had the plate and a special bottle for santas milk but Amelia was so tired we totally forgot to do it with her. She was so confused when she got up and there was a plate on a table in her play pen, but I’m glad we did it.
Pre-Christmas deep clean… this year I totally ran out of time for my deep clean and honestly there was so much going on that no one noticed or missed that it had been done. I’ve actually really enjoyed taking each room on to declutter clean and restock with our gifts that I think next year I’ll do my quarterly deep clean between Christmas and New Year intentionally, and save myself the pressure. Each room can get Christmas removed and a good thorough clean at the same time. I’ve even looked at our storage solutions to make life even easier and am looking forward to getting some rooms completed.
I’m sure I’ll think of more as time passes but with 3 days to reflect I think I’ve given myself quite a lot to think about already and quite a lot of improvements to make
Love, Jo-Anne
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