Simplifying Christmas
I have definitely noticed a trend this holiday season...lots of people are looking to simplify Christmas. Some are more money-conscious because of the economy, some are looking to make the holidays less stressful, and some are feeling convicted to put more Christ into Christmas. Whatever the reason, I support them 100% since we did the same thing 5 years ago. Quite a few people have asked me over the past couple of weeks how we do Christmas with the kids, so I decided to write a blog post about it. It's quite long, but I wanted to show how things progressed into what we do now so bear with me.In 2005 we left the Midwest (where we both grew up) and moved to the east coast for my husband's job. We also had our first child that fall. We were fortunate enough to be able to fly home one month later to spend Christmas with our families, but having a new baby and flying back home for the holidays drastically changed our attitude towards Christmas. I was still trying to get the hang of nursing, sleepless nights, and being a mom in general, so I didn't have the time or energy to go shopping for gifts. Also, any gifts we gave or received would have to fit in our suitcases. We decided we wanted to keep things as simple as possible so we asked our families if we could be left out of the gift exchanges, and we limited our gift-giving to contributing money towards group gifts for our parents. We also decided that sending out Christmas cards was not necessary. Earlier that year I had started emailing out 'Nystrom Family Updates' periodically, so I decided that the work and money required to send out Christmas cards was silly when I could instead send out a 'Merry Christmas' email that served the same purpose. And thus our simplified Christmas was born.
The following winter I was pregnant and we were (literally) in the middle of another cross-country move over Christmas. In December we packed up a moving truck and headed to the west coast, making a detour to MN for the holidays. Between the pregnancy and the move, we again were looking for simple when it came to holiday celebrations and asked our families if we could be left out of the gift exchanges. The only gifts we gave were monetary donations to charities in the names of our immediate family members. Because of several smaller relocations that year, we hadn't been attending (or tithing to) any church for 6 months, so we decided to split what we would have given to a church between the 25 members of our immediate family to donate to the charity of their choice. This was such an awesome experience for us as we learned about the different organizations our family members were passionate about, and also how much better it feels to give necessities to those in need rather than 'wants' to those who don't really need anything. Another successful simplified Christmas!
Our third winter away from the Midwest we decided not to fly home for the holidays. Instead we spent Christmas in sunny San Diego where we were living. This was the first time in our lives that we weren't going to be with family for Christmas, and Kade was now old enough to understand what was going on around him. We needed to really think about what we wanted Christmas to be for our family. Based on how well the previous two Christmas seasons had gone, we decided that our new family tradition would be to keep Christmas simple. No gifts, no stress, just focusing on others and celebrating the birth of Christ. I did a lot of research about the meaning behind various Christmas traditions and decided which ones we would pass down to our kids, and which ones we would let go. Since Paul and I both hated how much our society focuses on Santa and presents during the holidays, I got rid of all our Santa decorations that we'd accumulated over the years and we did not tell Kade anything about Santa. Instead we got our first Christmas tree and decorated it with white lights and meaningful ornaments to remind us of the Trinity (triangle shape), the Light of the world-Jesus (lights), everlasting life (evergreen), and the importance of family and relationships (ornaments). Paul read the Christmas story from the Bible (just like his dad always did back home), and we went to the Christmas Eve service at our church (which was awesome). Our only 'gifts' were handing out coffee and cookies to the homeless, and donating money to an organization our church was sponsoring over the holidays. We got together with everyone from our church small group that hadn't gone home for the holidays (which was just about everyone), ate too much, and played games. We did do a white elephant gift game with them, but we made a rule that no one could buy the gifts they brought. Instead everyone had to find something around their house to bring, and re-gifting was strongly encouraged. We liked the game so much we have done it every year since with our small groups.
Our fourth Christmas away from the Midwest we had a 5-day-old baby and we were also packing up to move to a new house right down the street the following week. My parents were staying with us to help with the baby and the move so we celebrated Christmas with them in our house full of boxes. This was our simplest Christmas to date...we continued the traditions from the previous year of attending a Christmas Eve service at church, reading the Christmas story from the Bible, and having a Christmas tree (although we had to improvise because of the move by hanging a paper Christmas tree on the wall that Kade helped to color), and we also lit candles on an angel food cake and sang 'Happy Birthday' to Jesus (something Paul's mom always did with their family on Christmas Eve).
Last year we moved back to MN and spent Christmas with my sister's family. They do Christmas very differently than us (lots of Santa traditions and presents, just like my parents did when I was a kid), but we were still able to make things work for both of our families. We went to a Christmas Eve service at our church before going to her house, and they waited to open their gifts until my kids were in bed. We still did the 'Happy Birthday Jesus' cake and read the Christmas story from the Bible, and my sister and I also decided to make lefse (a tradition from my mom's side of the family). Earlier in December we had taught the kids about Saint Nicolaus for the first time. We explained to them that St. Nic gave to those who were less fortunate than he was, and since we have been blessed with so much we should be like St. Nic and give to those who have less than us (the Veggie Tales movie called 'Saint Nicolaus: A Story of Joyful Giving' is a wonderful way to teach kids this story). I got some 'St. Nic' hats and we wore them when we donated some toys to a local Toys for Tots drive. We also let them help pick out things to fill a shoebox through Samaritan's Purse for Operation Christmas Child (which we have done since we got married).
This year we spent Christmas with my sister's family again, only this time at our house. Once again we managed to do things as we each wanted without too much hassle. Both of us explained to our kids that we celebrate Christmas a little differently and left it at that. They went to a Christmas Eve service with us at our church, we watched a couple Christmas movies about the birth of Christ, we did the 'Happy Birthday Jesus' cake, and I read kids' versions of the Bible Christmas story from some books I got at the library. We kept the menu simple, split up the burden of meal making, and everyone helped with the clean up. Christmas was still simple and relaxing, even with us hosting! As our 'gifts' this year both Kade and Jacey filled containers for Operation Christmas Child (Kade even decided to use some of his birthday money to pay for the shipping costs, which made us so proud), and we also bought a goat for a family in Haiti (a couple from our small group was going down there for a mission trip and were able to actually purchase the goat in a market and deliver it to the family). Something I'm thinking of doing next year is wrapping some empty boxes in wrapping paper, taping pictures of the things we've done/given as our 'gifts' to Jesus over the years, and putting them under the Christmas tree to help us remember them.
To sum things up, each Christmas since we've had kids has been a little different, but the overall theme for us is simplicity. Christmas is a relaxing and stress-free time of year for us and we love it! We stick to what is most important to us and forget the rest. We try not to do anything out of obligation. We carry on the traditions that mean the most to us and that we feel motivated and inspired to do, and don't feel guilty for leaving some behind. And for those of you who are wondering how we manage to do Christmas without Santa, substituting the story of Saint Nicolaus (as I described above) has really worked for us. We treat the story of Santa like any other make-believe story (such as Goldilocks, Toy Story, etc.), explaining that it is not real but just a story that someone made up for our entertainment. At the same time, we also remind them to respect that other families do things different and that some kids think Santa is real because that is what their parents teach them so we shouldn't ruin that for them (which we also do for the Easter bunny and the tooth fairy). When someone asks the kids what they want for Christmas or comment about Santa, we have taught them to say "we celebrate Jesus' birthday and give like St. Nic did". They also like to tell people about what we did for others (such as buying the goat for the family in Haiti). If they ever seem concerned about not getting presents (especially when that is what all the other kids around them are talking about), we help them realize that we give them everything they need (and much of what they want), that they have plenty of toys, and that they get presents on their birthday and Jesus gets presents on His birthday (our gift to Him is following His greatest commandment of LOVE).
