Gearing Up for "A Holiday-Ready Heart"!
Maybe November and December are your two favorite months of the year.
Perhaps preparing for, living through, and cleaning up after the holidays doesn’t phase you in the least.
You may have your Christmas shopping all done, your cards ready to mail, and your thanksgiving menu completely planned.
If these are true for you, then The PURSE-onality Challenge holiday edition is not designed for you. (But please join us anyhow and give us your best advice!)
However, if you…
- dread dragging out the holiday decorations…
- wonder how what should be “the best of times” all too often often ends up being “the worst of times”…
- wish you could hibernate from October 30 ’til January 1…
- become overwhelmed by the commercialized chaos that tries to overtake your life in December…
- cringe just thinking about spending yet another holiday with certain people…
- feel like a failure because you never seem able to do everything “just right” for the holidays…
- have an over-full calendar already (and the invitations haven’t even started coming!)
- wonder how on earth you’re going to afford everything this season…
- miss loved ones more than ever during the holidays…
- want to focus on the real reason for the season…
…then I hope you’ll join us in October for “A Holiday-Ready Heart“!
Each day during October, we’ll examine an issue that often triggers holiday “baditude.” And we’ll plan ahead to focus, instead, on God’s word and gratitude when Thanksgiving and Christmas roll around this year.
For some, this may take just a slight tweak. For many though, this will require a serious overhaul of how we approach the holidays with our hearts.
Join us for 31 days of intentionally pray-paring for the most peace-full, joyous, family-focused, meaning-filled holy-days we can possibly have!
As we gear up toward our Warm-Up Week September 24-30, you’re welcome to:
___ “Like” The PURSE-onality Challenge Facebook Page
___ Check out The PURSE-onality Challenge blog
___ Subscribe to The PURSE-onality Challenge
___ Get familiar with The PURSE-onality Challenge concept
___ Go thru the Pre-Challenge Checklist
___ Listen to “De-LIGHT-full Giving in a Weighty World“
___ Listen to “Let’s Get PURSE-onal!
Your Turn:
- How do you feel about the upcoming holidays this year?
- What are your favorite parts of the holidays?
- What are your least favorite parts of the holidays?
- Anything else on your heart!
I buy all my gifts for every holiday, birthday, anniversary, etc, on sale after Christmas. By the end of Feb I am finished shopping for the year. I wrap everything up and put the name tags and card on them. I pack them all away in totes in the basement, with the ones I’ll need first on top. I do all the cooking for both our families. That’s stressful, because the 2 families don’t get along at all, so we have to have 2 separate meals every holiday. This past Easter, my bff came over early and helped me do all the cooking and cleaning. So the day of the meals, I had no mess or cooking. I think that’s going to be a new tradition. I always get excited about the upcoming holidays, but i end up putting up my tree way too early (the 1st week of Nov usually) so by the time Dec gets here, I want to take it down. This year I’m trying to wait till the first week of Dec to put it up. Five years ago we watched everyone rip through their gifts and go to the next, not even looking at their gifts first. That night we talked about it (it was our first Christmas together) and decided that we would focus on Jesus as the reason for the holiday. So we sent out a letter with the thank you cards, explaining that because the holidays are about Jesus’s birth, we will be focused on Him only. We limited the gift amount to 10 dollars, now the families get a box of candy and some homemade gifts, like a blanket, or just food (none of them cook so they appreciate this so much). The children get 3 gifts, to represent the 3 gifts. After we started doing that, it was like everyone’s outlook changed. Including ours, we no longer dreaded the holidays (especially Christmas), and we no longer felt the need to go over the top on gifts. We do 3 or 4 crafts before dinner, we have a couple traditions we’ve started (like sitting around the fire place talking about all the good things that happened that year, and what we look forward to in the coming year) since that holiday. Honestly everyone seems so much happier now when we do the holidays. I still don’t like cooking 2 separate meals at every holiday, but our families are not able to be in a room for 20 mins without starting a fight with each other. That is the one thing I’d change. I really like this post!!! What a great series!
At this point in time of the year, I can’t wait for the holidays! However, by mid-November, the feeling of dread and being overwhelmed start to creep in and I loose the joy of the season. I would LOVE to be able to enjoy the big and little things and celebrate a SEASON not just a day. I am looking forward to your series!
Rebecca
I guess my favorite part of the holiday is the anticipation….much more than the actual day.
Thinking about the meaning, spending time at home, enjoying decorations, making our home inviting to our family.
I would like to entertain, but we usually don’t.
I have a feeling my 31days and your 31days are going to compliment each other nicely. 🙂
I despise them……
I always dread the upcoming holidays. No, let me be more specific, I dread Christmas. How sad is that? Dreading the celebration of my Savior’s birth…Well, That is certainly not the part I dread, it is the finacial part I dread. The expectations, spending money that I do not have, etc. Actually, I enjoy Thanksgiving more than Christmas by far!
After listening to the delight-full lecture, I realized I am one of those terrible gift givers who don’t really understand gift giving(or getting). The best holidays recently were those during extended unemployment because I placed a ban on gift exchange. As the notes of the first Christmas carol peal from the radio or mall Muzak, I am gripped with panic. It is an undefined mixture of guilt and grief and anxiety. What if I don’t find the perfect gift? What if I neglect to buy a gift for someone who surprises me with one? I hate the hours wasted shopping without selecting anything. When I do choose something as time grows short, I dread seeing the disappointment my hastily selected gifts bring. I’m looking forward to any helpful suggestions this group can offer.
I really try to enjoy the holidays but so much pressure gets placed on me that I tend to snap & not enjoy them. This year will be especially hard; DS18 goes to boot camp on Dec 3; turns 19 on Dec 15. He’s my oldest of 3 kids but still my baby. We always host thanksgiving & this will also be his going away party. Talk about stress!
Heidi J
Holidays? I try not to think about them at all, let alone feel anything. I usually try to see things through my kids’ eyes, but that only carries me so far. I like the Puritans…no holidays. 😀 I’ll be honest, though I hadn’t planned to be this honest, I hate them all coz they produce a level of “fake-ness” in my family that is repulsive. Verbally kill each other all year, be nasty in front of and behind the back. Hate, constant anger, abuse. Then, miraculously, we are supposed to be different on holidays? Yeah, I could probably use some therapy but I have too many kids in school. 😉 Hopefully this challenge will help. I’d like to enjoy them for Christ’s sake and for my children’s sake, not for the sake of people around me who are annoyed that I don’t like them.