Well it’s that time of year again. If you are in the US, Thanksgiving is just around the corner and following that is the official kick off for the Christmas shopping season. Our Sunday paper has already started to fill up with the “toy books” and what not to try and get the children into the pestering mood to try and convince parents that they just have to have all this stuff.
Over the last 26+ years of raising our family, we have run the entire gamete of Christmas’s and we were blessed to be able to enjoy them with our children in many different ways during those years. Now with four grandchildren, the joys of many more holiday seasons is upon us too.
Looking back, I now realize that in many ways we spoiled our children when it came to Christmas. We were never wealthy by American standards, but we weren’t poor either. I remember one particular Christmas about 15 years ago when we had a very difficult financial year and we knew that it was going to be very lean that Christmas. We literally had a dollar store Christmas that year, and felt terrible about the lack of gifts of what we felt where “worthy” gifts.
You know what happened that year? The kids had no issue with it at all. In fact, they instead taught us a lesson about “gifts and giving” that year. It doesn’t matter what the gift is, it really is the thought that counts. Do you know how I know that? If you ask my kids what they remember about past Christmas’s at home, both of my boys and girls remember the great gifts they got one year, part of which were bags of “plastic soldiers and paper dolls” that they played with for hours and hours following that Christmas. They of course remember the Nintendo’s and Play Stations too, but the bags of plastic soldiers and paper dolls are always what they remember first.
The moral of this all is this? Don’t stress out over the season if you are in for a tight one. Your kids will still love you, and it’s a perfect opportunity to teach them (or maybe they you) the real meaning of Christmas and that it’s about Jesus’ birthday first, giving from the heart second, and if there is anything left for gifts…that would be last. Jesus is the reason for the season, not “Santa Claus”.Gifts of “love” far outlast the gifts of the “wallet”!
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