Getting ready for Christmas

Now that my sanctuary is finished and I'm all settled in, I can finally turn my attention toward getting ready for Christmas.

Most years, I've completed my shopping by Remembrance Day (yes, you read that right).  I really don't like being in the stores as it gets close to the big day; I simply can't handle the hustle and bustle any more.

But having been delayed this year by all the construction chaos around here, I've only recently got started on the serious business of holiday preparations.

Fortunately, we don't have a long list of persons for whom to buy gifts.

The difficult part, for us, is deciding what to get for people.

You see, I really don't see the point in buying a gift simply for the sake of having something to give to someone.  I choose gifts that are specific to the person, something I think they would like (or something from the list they have nicely provided to me).

Of course, we also make our own greeting card every year.  And usually, we take the photo one year to be used on the following year's card.  But for some reason, we didn't do that last year.  So when I pulled the file, there was no photo in it.  Luckily, we had a brief dusting of snow one day and it stayed long enough for us to get a suitably "wintery" shot to use for the card and I managed to get them all printed without too much hassle.

This morning, I signed my share of the Canada-bound cards, and they are ready to go in the mail.  John is busy signing his now, so they will all go in the mail on Monday.  (The UK and USA-bounds ones were mailed this past Tuesday.)

In the meantime, I've managed to amass a collection of gifts for all but two recipients so I guess I'm doing not too badly in that department, all things considered.  I even have two gifts for my darling husband!

This evening, my step-son and his wife (the step-daughter-in-law who is a year older than I but who calls me "Mummy" just because we like to have fun with that) are coming for dinner so they can see my "ready for viewing" sanctuary.  They were here before any furniture was put in place and they loved it then, so now they are anxious to see how I've organized it.

Over the course of the next three days, I plan to put up my Christams village and make my meat pies.

Then, I'll be ready for the big day and I can rest until it gets here.