I recently attended a monthly meeting where a couple of people stopped to ask me how my holidays were. This wasn’t casual conversation though. They were genuinely curious because they had last seen me in mid December when I shared that my family was experimenting with skipping Christmas in 2014. When I shared the results, one of my colleagues suggested I blog about it, not next October as I had planned, but now while the holidays are still fresh in everyone’s mind.
Our experiment came about because back in January 2014 my husband and I thought it might be fun to take a trip with my parents and sister’s family to one of our favorite places, Sanibel/Captiva Island, Florida. It quickly became clear the only time everyone’s schedules lined up would be Christmas week. Knowing we would be gone for the week of Christmas, my husband and I agreed we’d take advantage of the opportunity to experiment with a much simpler holiday experience. The simpler experience also seemed to tie in nicely with my experimentation with essentialism. We agreed holiday simplicity would look like the following: No tree, no decorations, no holiday baking, no outside lights, no holiday cards, and no gifts with the exception of those for the children which we limited to two gifts each. Our gift to each other would be the experience.
A Different Type of Experience
My husband has never been a fan of the hub bub of the holidays, so he championed this agreed upon simplicity from the beginning. While I endorsed the idea, I have to admit it felt strange not decorating or having a tree in my living room. It felt strange not creating and sending out holiday cards. It felt strange not putting up lights outside or making cookies. It didn’t take long for the strangeness to wear off though and for me to embrace this new way of experiencing the holiday season.
This new way was relaxed and not rushed. This new way was about spending time enjoying the company of those we cared about instead of spending time decorating the house. This new way was about giving two meaningful gifts (a book and an experience) to each of our children instead of dealing with the madness of holiday shopping. This new way was about a different kind of holiday experience and we discovered we really liked it.
Benefits
The benefits of this new way became especially clear when working with my clients who were each in their own way struggling with the overwhelm the holidays brings on. I shared my experiment with a few of them. One client, who experimented with scaling back her Christmas decorating, discovered benefits of doing less, especially spending less time unpacking and packing back up decorations. I had to agree with her – the best holiday gift I received this year was the gift of time. Time created by letting go of the holiday hub-bub.
Will we be radically downsizing our holidays every year? I’m not sure, but I do know that my 14-year-old nephew told me he wished our trip to the beach would become our new family tradition for the holidays. No matter where we are for the holidays, I know I will be scaling back, focusing on what is most important and what will make for a less stressful and more expansive holiday season.
What About You?
Am I suggesting a radical holiday downsizing is right for everyone? No, but I am asking you to consider what’s most important to you during the holidays and to put that front and center for you. If it is the look and feel of a fully decorated home, by all means decorate away. If it is making hundreds of Christmas cookies, don’t let me suggest you do otherwise. But if it is about spending time with those you care about consider what you might do in December 2015 to create more of that time. I’d love to hear your thoughts.
Andrea- I love this! I have really been discovering minimalizing and simplifying. Great experiment and so happy it worked for your family.
Marnie, So glad you loved it! I’m always interested in others’ experiments with minimalizing and would love to share thoughts at some point!
Love this! I don’t have kids and so I think it’s hard for me to advocate for no tree, cards, etc. but I now have your blog to share with people who are considering the possibility.
Regina, Thanks for reading and I encourage you to advocate away! My kids are 20, but my sister’s are 12 & 14. None of them seemed to miss the tree, etc. All of them seemed to appreciate more time to connect with aunts, uncles, cousins and grandparents.
Andrea, great post. We’ve experimented in the past with Thanksgiving and with New Years, but not (yet) with Christmas. That said, we’ve scaled back a LOT over the past few years, so the set up is done in a few hours as a family event, not a “chore.” Makes a huge difference.
So glad your experiment was fun and focused on family and conversation!
Jim, thanks for stopping by and for sharing. I love the idea of a set up event that lasts a few hours, instead of the chore of setting up that drags on over the course of a few days. Might be an idea that resonates with some of my readers!
Bravo!! I gave up a Christmas tree decades ago because it just didn’t seem to be worth the time and effort involved. (My husband DOES put a tree up in the mountain house so our holiday rental guests can enjoy it though) I also stopped sending Christmas cards — again the ROI was no longer there. We do a BIT of decorating in the house, but nothing extreme and it takes about a half-hour to do (and also to UNDO), which is just fine with me. We don’t do much in the way of Christmas shopping anymore either, save for… Read more »
Monica thanks for sharing what you do to keep the holidays less stressful. I’m so appreciating that folks like you, Jim, Regina and Marnie are sharing that having a holiday that doesn’t look like a magazine spread is not just something I’m suggesting, but is something that is very real for any number of people. How normalizing for us all!
I know a couple of people who would latch on to this idea like crazy! 🙂