Christmas is my favorite holiday of the year. I love all of the excitement, joy, fun events, the music, visits to Santa, Christmas cards, yummy food, the Christmas tree and other decorations, and everything else about it. And, of course, I love celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ throughout the season and having that special worship service on Christmas Eve. It's wonderful having so many visual and audible reminders about Jesus as I go about my days!
I was thinking about my gift list today and realized that's one of the reasons that I love Christmas. It may sound shallow to say that, but gifts are my love language, so I have a reason to express my love language over and over as I work on my gift list, start buying gifts early, finish up with the last-minute ones and the stocking stuffers and then get the joy of giving them to people! It's why I put pressure on myself to find something they'll really enjoy or need and why I find it so frustrating when people make it difficult to figure out what they'd like. Not everyone needs to have an Amazon wishlist for me to know what to get, but it makes it easier if I don't know enough about their interests or hear "I don't really need anything" or "I'm not sure what to get her, either" when I'm trying to figure something out.
And it's why I have a hard time drawing the line on buying gifts for some people and have to tell myself 'Seriously, you are giving them plenty. Enough. Save it for the next occasion.' That doesn't happen with James, though, because his birthday is about 5 weeks after Christmas, so I usually struggle with the opposite problem of using all my best ideas for Christmas, then having to figure out what to do for his birthday. Or I forget that I'll have another gift-giving occasion in the near future for him and try to cram it all in for Christmas.
I'm always disappointed when I'm done buying gifts and then just have to wait for Christmas to give them away. If I had more disposable income, I think I'd just keep buying things to donate to charity and go crazy with it! Maybe one day I can do more of that. For now, I have to practice self-control, being wise with our finances and making sure I'm keeping my focus where it belongs, instead of being too wrapped up in the gifts. But I'm sure looking forward to giving them away!
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