I admit I’m a holiday slacker. I’m not the biggest Christmas fan and decided years ago that for my own sanity that there were things I would no longer do. Less stress, more fun I have! And it’s all about me, right?
Last year I tried to do too much and I had a meltdown by New Years. This year I’m traveling right before everyone comes so by necessity I am doing less.
So I stopped sending out holiday cards years ago, I am sad that I don’t get that many cards but not that sad… I don’t bake cookies anymore. I miss the cookies but not the calories.
What don’t you do anymore? Make this Christmas slacker feel better :).
I dropped out of the office 5-day “secret Santa” thing that happens every year. Makes me feel a little “grinchy”, but is one of a few things I cut out to relieve the holiday stress level.
Christmas cards only to 1 good childhood friend. This one card is meaningful - I dropped the tradition with others when too many cards seemed to become a opportunity to brag bout how “my family is doing so very well” with little thought for how I or my family was doing.
I don’t decorate. Hubby does, so I get to enjoy.
I don’t bake, but did make homemade fruitcake (yes, really) last year. Cakes were delicious and I settled on a favorite recipe to be repeated this year - dried fruit, not candied.
I do find a Christmas concert that I want to attend - either professional or very fine church choir. Relaxing after years of “must attends” and “must provide transport” for the kids.
Here’s the real time saver. I don’t Christmas shop. I pick up things throughout the year and have a private wrapping party with recorded Christmas carols and a glass of sherry (or two) on some random, I-need-to-lift-my-spirits afternoon.
I gave up Christmas cards years ago. It felt like a huge weight lifted off of me! I don’t bake either. And I never did Elf on the Shelf - too much stress trying to figure out what to do with him every. single. night.!
I never baked cookies. I hardly need the calories.
My H’s birthday and my birthday are both in late Dec right around Christmas. Years ago, we stopped giving gifts to one another. It’s just too much. Neither of us need anything. It becomes buying just to buy.
Our family used to give cards to one another and at one point we just realized it was stupid to, say, go over my sister’s house and we’d exchange $100 worth of greeting cards (from me to my sister, from my kids to my sister, from them to us, etc) when we were all just sitting in the same darn room together. So now we only do cards to the kids and then from kids to grandparents.
I used to decorate my home for holidays but I’ve cut down on that too. I really feel a strong need to deckutter and live more simply than I used to, now that the kids are gone.
I don’t do Christmas cards. And we don’t go overboard on the decorating - one 3 ft. tree, a candle in the window and a nativity set. I don’t do Christmas shopping in stores anymore - all online. But I love to bake, so I do several kinds of cookies and give them to friends and other folks (building porter, college kids who don’t go home for the holidays, etc)
I had to streamline years ago just to maintain sanity. At that time I stopped holiday cards, baking cookies as gifts, and entertaining.
Now I’m doing less just because I don’t derive enjoyment from it. No more outside lights. No more outside window swags and bows. Smaller tree. Fewer decorations inside, because what goes up, must come down, and I’m basically lazy.
We do not have a huge Christmas Eve get together. We sleep late on Christmas Eve, maybe do some last minute shopping; we love to go eat out on Christmas Eve then go to church and come home and watch Christmas movies.
Of course this totally does not match up with my moms expectations of Christmas Eve so I’m seriously glad she is not spending the holidays with us this year!
@CGHTeach …I used to hate office Secret Santas! Ours used to run over the entire month and even had people creating “wish lists.” I participated for two years and then stopped. It was the biggest relief!
I barely go to stores in December. We didn’t do cards last year and I often send them after Christmas even if I do send them. S2 just told us he wants us not to wait till the last minute for a tree. He wants better choices than we had last year. I don’t do a huge amount of decorating. A tree, a creche, some tchokes. I do like baking cookies. In fact I’m going to do the first batch today to take to a Channukah party tomorrow.
I should also mention that we buy fewer gifts as well. Family exchanges have stopped, no more teacher gifts, hubby and I stopped exchanging, and gifts for kids are fewer but more expensive.
And most of the shopping is done online. That’s a huge stress reliever!
Deb, I think you are my kindred spirt! <3 Love this thread and am happy to join it!
Gave up Christmas cards years ago. I dreaded doing it each and every year. Huge relief to just NOT do it. Like you said, I don’t get as many cards now, that’s ok.
Putting out every Christmas knickknack in the attic. Just no. I limit the indoor decorating to lighted spots on the mantel, piano, staircase -but very simply - and a few other things that make me happy. No one even noticed when I stopped putting out every little nativity scene, santa claus, etc.
Black Friday shopping. No thanks!
Online shopping overall. Thumbs up!
Got rid of the “buy for all the adults in the family” tradition. SIL suggested several years to have an alternative “family secret santa” - one gift, $25, food related in any way. (we are a foodie family) Much more fun, much savings. It was getting ridiculous that we were essentially trading gift cards!!!
I do bake alot and enjoy that as long as I have some time to do it.
The one thing that would make things perfect? If the presents could magically wrap themselves!! I hate wrapping!
Our basement flooded the week of Christmas and in the middle of a blizzard one year. That’s when we really cut back on Christmas. No more lugging out the 7" tall Christmas tree that takes up half a room. (Friends had given it to us when they moved.) No more Christmas cards or putting up outdoor lights that took forever to find the time to take down. Our extended families stopped doing present exchanges years ago. I bake, but we’ve made cookies so many times this year, that I don’t see myself doing it this month. We love indoor colored garland Christmas lights as it just makes our tree-shaded living room happier. (Our son has blue ones in his room and already bought a new set for his future dorm room.) They’ve been up for a month already in a big blanket fort my son and I constructed so he’d have a unique, relaxing place to study for his standardized tests and to work on his college & scholarship applications.
We took advantage of the online sales last week and bought our presents. It’s “Hey, what do you want for Christmas? Come make your list and order it.” We’ve done that for a few years now because who knows what you want or need better than yourself? Hub and son though always find me the perfect coffee, grammar police, and Firefly graphic t-shirts. I’m looking at the hyper squirrel “Coffee…need more coffee!” one right now. LOL! There are two presents that will be a surprise to my son and we’re positive his geeky fanboy heart will love them.
Next year, if he’s dating and brings his SO home for the holidays, then we’ll probably go all out.
^^^^ So well said - I do like how the lights make the house warmer and “happier” - but layers and layers of decorations, knick knacks, etc. - they do not make me feel “happier” - and it’s not a look I like.
What don’t I do for Christmas? I don’t do anything that I don’t want to do. Last year we were having the whole family over and doing a lot on entertaining so I (joyfully) went all out. This year we are enjoying the efforts of others. Next week I will go out and buy a natural cedar wreath and a few boughs. But that’s the full extent of my effort. Feels just as good as going all out did last year.
I stopped decorating throughout the house. Like another poster said, no one notices. I got rid of the knickknack decorations and just put up favorites.
I stopped putting the wreaths out on my front door.
I stopped buying for relatives we don’t actually see during the holidays anymore…what a waste of time and money.
I stopped doing the christmas cookie decoration with the kids…they grew up.
The neighbor moms stopped doing an XMAS exchange…one less gift to buy.
Boy, I feel like a Scrooge writing this, but my Decembers Past used to actually make me one.
The one thing I STILL do is I have a Christmas wrapping party for one! It used to take me 4 nights, now just a few hours. I go to our basement with all my wrapping laid out and take a bottle of wine and Christmas movies. I wrap, watch movies and get loopy and sentimental.
