For me the holidays really start with Halloween because I LOVE Halloween.
Next comes a family "holiday" in Noah's birthday. He turned five shortly before Thanksgiving. The theme was Angry Birds. The gifts were Angry Birds. The cake was Angry Birds. Then comes Thanksgiving and this year that happened to be Husband's birthday as well. He did not get an Angry Bird cake. But Prezzy the Elf did appear with our Christmas tree the following day.
We celebrated Bodhi Day as a family. They received new children's books that teach about meditation and the Buddha. We made Bodhi cookies in the shapes of the star and Bodhi leaves. There was quite a bit of snow that day so we also got some sledding done. That night at dinner (that included rice of course) we discussed what we were grateful for. Runa was grateful for her dinner and Noah was grateful for... wait for it.... angry birds.
And now Christmas is a week away. I want the days to slow down just a little. I want to enjoy every minute of holiday bliss. Which is counter to my kids who feel that time cannot pass quickly enough. Memories are permanent now and I am trying to make so many good ones for them. I am trying to make sure they get quality time with all their loved ones. I'm trying to make the perfect Christmas atmosphere and I am trying to hard. I know this because when the moment isn't as magical as it was in my head I get upset.
I have spent time remembering my own childhood the past couple days. What do I remember most? I certainly remember Christmas mornings and Christmas Day at Grandma's. But it's not really the gifts I remember. It's stuff like the star Christmas lights my parents had in the picture window in the livingroom. The food fight at grandma's that got most of us in trouble. Walking home from the bus stop and seeing the decorations. My dad getting off early on Christmas Eve and getting to spend more time with us. The anticipation of Christmas break. Sledding down the hill near my parents house.
But if I take it a step further I find that those are a small fraction of my childhood memories. In fact most of my memories about the more mundane things. Playing in my room with my off white bedroom furniture and the smell of the lilacs outside. Our swing set and sandbox in the back yard. Helping my dad in the garden and our pet rabbits having babies. The kittens born in the shed. Riding bikes and playing with friends in the neighborhood and catching fireflies. Watching meteor showers in the driveway. I literally have hundreds of random memories of just little everyday things we did growing up.
Sure, I remember some of the bad stuff too. Poor choices on my part or when money was tight and the strife of just growing up. But overall those are very much eclipsed by the other stuff.
I need to slow down and stop trying to create that "perfect memory" and let the memories create themselves. I need to trust my children to assign importance to the moment in their own way. For whatever reason I seem to feel an urgency during this time of year. And then I project that urgency out on to everyone else and now we are all stressed out. Are my kids going to fondly look back on the Christmas cookie baking that I was upset they weren't participating or are they more likely to remember that random Tuesday night when we all played with finger paints at the table? I don't know if I ever made Christmas cookies with my parents but I certainly remember going fishing with my mom or playing with the Legos in the kitchen with my dad. And while I do remember the one Christmas dinner food fight, I remember dozens of just regular family dinners at home.
It was a good exercise as a parent to "inventory" my memories. In a way it was my Christmas gift because it will allow me to relax a bit on the "perfect Christmas" front and focus more on the mundane. And I will never under value that walk we took, that tent we built from sheets or the dance tickle game ever again.
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