Fails – Stress Free Christmas

Excellent Practical Ways To Actually Recover Quickly From Christmas

Christmas is over, gone, past, finished and done with – for this year! But what about NEXT Christmas? Did this Christmas go with a bang for you? Was it the best ever? Could it have been better?

I am not talking about your personal world because things can happen that we can do nothing about, that we can’t plan for and heartbreak can happen at any time. But if your Christmas plans did not work out, if your home looks like a garbage tip, if you were stressed out to the max, along with your credit cards and you are not looking forward to a long January with very little in the bank and big bills waiting to be paid then let’s look and see whether we can do something NOW to make sure NEXT Christmas goes more like the way you would like it to.

Easily Work Out What Went Wrong For You

Holiday depression and post holiday depression are very common, especially during and after Christmas. There can be many triggers; loneliness, family rows, the time of the year (the cold and dark), feelings of alienation from what is going on, etc. If you feel depressed – whether post Christmas or just generally depressed – please seek medical advice. There are many ways these days of helping people with depression and you shouldn’t just get told to “pull yourself together”! Please seek help now.

Totally separate from health concerns, there are many common themes to post-Christmas upsets, rows and annoyance over what did or did not happen. While it may not be possible to change what has happened, it is certainly possible to start planning now, so that next Christmas will be better. Ignoring it means setting yourself up for a repeat of what you did not enjoy this time round. If you want next Christmas to be better, start planning now, to ensure a better Christmas for you and your family and friends.

Overspent

Overspending at Christmas is a common complaint AFTER the event. If you have overspent, then you need to get your finances back into good order and THEN start planning for next Chrsitmas

Not enough Money

The old saying is that “you can’t make a silk purse from a sow’s ear”, that is, you must make do with what you have. That’s old advice but still sound. When our finances dipped, I told my kids NOT to buy me a Christmas present, after all, I actually had everything I needed and I definitely didn’t need something to clutter me up further! I also told them that I would spend less on them at Christmas, to account for getting no present from them 🙂 and also told them I would spend more on them on their birthday, which helped spread the financial load. I also told them that there was a financial limit and that they could have their present in cash if they preferred. They did! I also set a limit on what I would spend on the grandchildren, so they all had the same.

Planning Disaster

There are lots of areas that can be planned and prepared well ahead of time and with a good calendar and perhaps a journal or diary, it’s possible to have a stress free Christmas if you want it, with no planning disasters. Of course, that doesn’t guarantee no natural disasters but you cannot do much about those.

Not Ready In Time

Christmas comes on the same day each year – surprise, surprise, so a countdown can help get everything planned and managed in good time.

Home looks Like Disaster Zone

After Christmas, it can take some time to take down the decorations and the house may look bare without the tree and the lights but a bit done each day soon gets it completed. Packing everything away carefully will make next Christmas a lot easier.

Family and friend Rows

Unfortunately, holidays at all times can be marred by family rows, especially if fuelled with alcohol. If you find Christmas spoilt for you EVERY year, maybe it is time to consider NOT inviting the offending family member?

Important Revealed Here – How To Have An Awesome NEXT Christmas

Next Christmas starts here. I will be sharing storage, clearing and planning tips with you to help make next Christmas even better.

Once A Year

Christmas comes only once a year. “Thank goodness”, say some but maybe that’s because it can be hard to remember everything that needs to be done when there is a year between each occasion. It arrives on December 25th every year but when you are up to your oxters dealing with the alligators in a swamp you planned on draining, it can be easy to put off doing those things that will make “doing Christmas” easy, well, easier.

The Oven Broke

There was the year the oven would not cook. Now to be fair to the oven, it had been giving signs of a problem for a couple of months but the problem was only intermittent and my husband, who is “careful” with money thought the problem could wait, after all, we mostly used the top of the stove. Of course, while the turkey was only half cooked, the oven decided to go on the blink. We had to lift the turkey out, take it to our son’s house, finish cooking it there and bring it back, roasting hot! The guests had been warned of problems but decided to delay arriving at our house longer than expected. I had no oven to keep food warm, so we started eating without them. They were not impressed to arrive in to a meal that was half eaten and their share going cold!

No Christmas Cards

Cards not posted?

Then there was the year I retired from work. My last day was the last working day before the Christmas holidays and I spent my last three months in a golden haze of delight (no not alcoholic, just pure joy) and anticipation. My last working day was also the last posting date for Christmas cards, which naturally did not get posted. I normally send about 80 Christmas cards and only the ones for local neighbors, that get hand delivered, were sent. I sent out UnChristmas cards to my card list in February!

Turn It Off

No dinner

My mother in law held Christmas dinner for a number of years and we went to her house. My father in law was a careful saving man who turned all lights off to save on electricity whenever he could. I think that any switch he saw, he flipped into the “off” position and this habit resulted in my mother in law’s electric oven being turned off in the middle of cooking Christmas dinner. He was not too popular for a while.

Handling The Alcohol

Some relatives are known to imbibe too much of the liquid refreshments anyway and I don’t mean tea, coffee and soda! But most are fairly reasonable unless they are taking something they are not used to. One elderly aunt enjoyed the liqueur chocolates the first year we got them and together with the couple of glasses of sherry she normally took, were enough to need her to be put to bed for the afternoon to sleep it off!

Stress Free Christmas

Category: Fails

Awesome Practical Inspiration Now Christmas Is Over