Thursday, December 26, 2013

Our First Real Family Christmas

Hi friends!! I hope you had a lovely holiday!

We sure did.  We headed to Knoxville to celebrate with my family last Friday, and we got to open gifts Christmas Eve, as we left early Christmas morning to head back to Georgia to celebrate with Tony's side of the family.  Whirlwind, but a great trip!  We are always grateful to live close enough to both sides of our families to be able to do this.

Yet before we headed out on that excursion, we did a small family Christmas with just us.  Harper's still too little to really get it, but she sure knows how to rip wrapping paper and get excited about new stuff.  We took great inspiration from Emily of Imperfect in following this model of gift-giving: Something you Want, Something you Need, and Something to Read

I think this is a wonderful way to cover the bases but also keep gifting manageable and affordable, while taking away a bit of the greed of it all.  I hope to continue this each year with our children, so as to be better able to focus on other parts of the season as well, such as why we really celebrate and helping those less fortunate.  Sure, they will still turn into gift monsters with such generous grandparents, but hey, we tried.

In a left turn for us, Tony and I decided to get each other presents for the first time in, probably forever.  We just never have done it, deciding to save our money for things we want together, like trips or projects.  But with the Want, Need, Read model, we were able to spend just a little on some fun things.

We snuggled on the floor with the twinkle lights glowing and enjoyed our little Christmas.



Harper got this book, some bath letters, and a mini-person table that is actually not yet purchased (waiting to make a pilgrimage to Ikea) 


I got fun stuff like a nonstick skillet!



It was a cozy and perfect evening.



I love our little life.





3 comments:

  1. When I moved to PTC, I found your blog and started following you, this was in May. Not a bog commenter, but wanted to pipe up. I follow the three gift policy as well, for my 21 month and 3 month old. My question is how do you handle getting MANY gifts from other family members, ie grandparents? Do not want to insult them, but it truly is too much and way too overwhelming.

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    1. hi cassie!! so nice to "meet" you - so cool to meet another ptc person. :) we certainly did get a lot from the grandparents, but luckily she still got a lot of necessity type things like clothes too. we actually have never bought her a toy, since she has a july birthday and christmas - she gets plenty! so i guess i've just accepted that they will spoil her, and we keep it to that only. we also rotate toys out too, so as to not have so many at once!

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  2. Your face with the nonstick griddle is priceless. So glad you had a great holiday!

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