Spreading the Holiday cheer!

Do you volunteer during the Holidays? What organizations do you donate your time to? How do you teach your children the true meaning of the Holidays?

I used to do a lot of volunteering during the Holidays - from visiting nursing homes to butchering wrapping presents. But the past couple of years have been really crazy for us. Besides being dead pregnant and basically horizontal for the entire Christmas season last year, for the past 3 years we've spent Christmas in 3 different states. When things settle down a bit more and we're able to get settled in a place, I hope to start volunteering again, and not just around the Holidays.

Organizations that I generally like to support are rescues or pet shelters. I also like to take a box of goodies to the USO every week or so with my stockpile overflow. Eventually in the future, I would love to get involved in programs where we would foster a deployed solder's dog.

There are also a lot of easy but often overlooked ways to give back. You can help out a school by purchasing items through the Box Tops Marketplace - they will automatically donate a percentage of your purchase to the school of your choice (check out the link - I'm giving away a $50 Walmart giftcard). Macy's is donating $1 to the Make-A-Wish Foundation for every letter they receive in their "Santa Mail" mailboxes. These are just some extremely easy ways to give back that just about everybody can participate in.

This is the baby's first Christmas, but I'm already worrying about how to get the true meaning of the holidays over to her. She is the first everything (first grandchild, first great-grandchild, first niece...etc.) and our relatives have gone a bit psychotic in buying things for her. We're really appreciative of their generosity and their love, but it's just going to explode at Christmas. She's obviously not going to realize what's going on this Christmas or the next, but I do not want our daughter to grow up thinking Christmas is just about STUFF.

I think the key to teaching a child the true meaning of Christmas is to focus on the things that matter the most to your family. Make sure that gifts are not the thing they look forward to the most. Every child will look forward to gifts, but I think the trick is to get them just as excited about making gingerbread houses, or decorating the tree, or some other family tradition. Gifts last a year, if even that, but traditions last a lifetime.

Holiday food stuffs!

What is your favorite Holiday recipe? Describe your Holiday table. What is your biggest Holiday cooking disaster?

My favorite Holiday recipe is whatever my hubby cooks.  I'm a terrible cook, and I can manage simple dinners without too much of an uproar, but a Holiday meal is out of the question.  He's in charge of figuring what we're eating, making the menu, and cooking it.  I'm lucky if he lets me help with the mashed potatoes.

Since we never host dinners at our house, on account of the fact that we're in a different state from everyone else, there's really no special table setting.  I think last year we ate in front of the TV so he could catch the football game or something. 

I don't really have a Holiday cooking disaster to share, considering I'm not allowed in the kitchen (with good reason). I guess my only Holiday disaster related to food was when I had to throw up my entire Holiday meal last year while I was pregnant.  Hubby understood completely, but I still felt kind of bad that I couldn't even eat the meal he spent hours to prepare. 

Day 4 of the Christmas of Dreams Blog Party at MomDot is sponsored by Bottlewise and Glow Mama.

Budgeting for Christmas

When do you start Christmas shopping? How do you budget for Christmas? Do you stick to your budget?

I'm just going to come out and say it: I have no Christmas budget. I like to get each person something they will truly enjoy, so I try not to set a limit. Obviously, I'm going to be reasonable and not go broke because of Christmas presents, but I'm also not going to cap myself off at $20 if there's something for $30 or even $50 that I know the person will absolutely love.

However, since we're a military family and more often than not we're away from family for Christmas, my Christmas shopping depends mainly on the item's ease of shipping. Last year we skipped on the Christmas presents - people understood. Shipping presents across the country is no laughing matter. You can easily spend a hundred on shipping alone, especially when you have a HUGE family like us. We sent them lots of pictures and did elaborate photo Christmas cards instead.

This year, we're actually going home for Christmas, but we're not doing the whole present thing. Everyone would rather see the baby all of us than get presents, so it was agreed upon that we spend the money to go home for Christmas instead of buying stuff. We're still going to do a little something for everyone though - I'm thinking about getting a bunch of clay and making ornaments of the baby's hand/foot prints. It's cheap, simple, and will be adored by all.  If I get too busy though, my back-up plan is to grab a huge gift bow from the Dollar Tree and stick it on the baby's head. Granted, they'll have to share their "Christmas present" and they can't keep her, but I'm sure they'll love their present all the same.

We can't wait to go home for Christmas and see everyone, and I'm so happy not to have that burden of Christmas shopping on my shoulders. Christmas is about family anyway, not about stuff. It's important to remember what really matters. No matter how awesome the gift is, a decade later you probably won't have it anymore, and the memory that often stays with you is not what present you got, but the time that you spent with your family. Christmas presents is a nice gesture and a fun part of the holidays, but it's important not to go overboard. Get back to the basics and what Christmas is all about - family...!

Day 3 of the Christmas of Dreams Blog Party at MomDot is sponsored by Appledonia, Hippos Toes , and My Bag.

Family traditions, old and new!

Yesterday's MomDot party much fun! I met tons of great new bloggers, and I can't wait to meet more! This is getting more exciting by the day. Today's question (brought to you by

LaPlates, Lets Go Strolling, and Natitys Design) is:

What are some of your favorite family traditions? What are some traditions you want to begin?

We don't really have any traditions, considering this is only our 4th Christmas as a couple and the first Christmas as a family with a little baby! But we both have things that we did when we were growing up, so we try to make them into our own traditions.

My aunt gave me a snowman ornament, and for reasons that I still don't understand to this day, I LOVE that little snowman. He's completely beat up and he must be at least 15 years old now, but I love him and he must ALWAYS have a spot as close to the top of the tree as possible.

I spent some time in England as a kid, and they have these crackers there that are real big and a staple for Christmas. So now, every Christmas I must get a bunch of crackers. And the rule is that no one can crack one until Christmas day. But the thing is...I'm scared of cracking them. I'm weird.

A tradition that we started last year (and will probably keep) is that we each get to pick one present to open before bed on Christmas Eve.

I'm not sure what traditions we want to start - traditions aren't exactly planned, and they just happened. So we'll see what happens and what sticks!

Oh, and by the way, in our house, reindeer do not pull Santa's sleigh. Rein-puppies do. And Chloe is on the secret rein-puppy team. She's got all the inside info on rein-puppy business, but she's not a liberty to share.

Mom Dot party day #1!

Today's day #1 of the Mom Dot blog party, and I'm so excited to be playing along! Today's question (brought to you by

La Belle Toile and This and That by Randi) is:

Introduce us to your family and share Holiday pics of years past

Our crazy family consists of me, my hubby, the little Princess, and our crazy dogs. Since this will be the little Princess' first Christmas, we really don't have any past holiday pictures. Well, technically, she was in the last one. This year we'll be going home to see family for Christmas, and at least one relative has made arrangements to get super-mega family portrait. We're still working on our little family Christmas pictures, but it's rather hard because I want our ENTIRE family in there, dogs included. I don't even want to think about trying to get one decent picture with 2 crazy dogs and a 6 month-old...

Last year we paid a hobby photographer to do it, and we were able to do it outside. It's currently 45º out, so I don't think we'll be doing the whole outside thing this year. Which really limits what we can do, considering we have the dogs. Maybe I'll just bribe my dad to do it when my parents visit for Thanksgiving...