Holiday Fun List

This year I'm starting early with my Christmas enjoyment.  Probably not early for some, but early for us.  Usually I'm running around last minute getting the decorations up and inevitably nixing lots because it's only a week til Christmas and let's face it those babies will be coming down soon.  But not this year.  This year I'm on it because I want to have more time to enjoy all that the season has to offer.  And I'm ready to begin now.  It all started with finally finishing up painting my living room {it only took a year to finish...can you say procrastination...but that's another post...anywho}.  So now I'm inspired to get to the Christmas decorating!

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That's not my house, but I sure thought it was pretty!

One other thing that I was ready for is putting together a Holiday Fun List.  In the summertime these were all over the web as a way to capture ideas of all the fun things you wanted to do over the summer.  We did one then and loved it.  So I decided, let's put one together with all the things we'd like to enjoy over this holiday season.  We came up with a long list of fun activities that we can't wait to get started on.
Here's just a little part of our list....

Bake cookies together

Visit Longwood Gardens Christmas Display

Drive around and look at Christmas lights

Get a live tree for Christmas

Do a Jesse Tree together 

Watch Christmas shows and movies

Make Christmas decorations together

Take lots of pics

Have fires in the fireplace

Make hot chocolate

Go to Grandmom & Papa's house

Have our 2nd annual New Year's Eve party together

Play Christmas music in the house

In order to do the things on our list we may need to say no to other things that come up.  We created this list together as a family because these things have been important to us in the past and they are things we'd like to do again.   Other things are new and we'd like to take the time to try them.  This list isn't a thing of compulsion, a thing we need to strictly stick to in order to check off every activity and give ourselves a "successful holiday" stamp of approval.  No, we may not even get to all of the activities and that's okay.  It's just simply a tool to get us to really figure out how we as a family would like to spend our time and celebrate the holidays.  This helps us to decide what's important to us and makes it easier to allot our precious time.

Because before you know it your schedule can be filled with commitments that may be fun, but just keep you busy and away from the times that mean the most to your family.  Like snuggling on the couch together over hot chocolate and Christmas cookies to watch Rudolph or Frosty.

So gather your family together and ask them how they'd like to spend the holidays.

Make it a specially-made holiday that reflects who you are and what's important to you as a family.

What's on your Holiday Fun List?