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Are you planning on decorating your home for the holidays this year? If so, there is a good chance that you will be in need of decorations. When it comes to decorating for Christmas, many individuals automatically head to their local department store or specialty Christmas shop. Buying your Christmas decorations is a great way to get the decorations that you need, but did you know that buying is not your only option? If you are a parent, you are encouraged to let your children make their own Christmas decorations. You will find that there are, literally, an unlimited number of benefits to doing so.
One of the greatest benefits to letting your children make their own Christmas decorations is the feeling that they will receive with the finished product. No matter what the age of your child or children, there is a good chance that they will be pleased with their final products, whether that final product be a Christmas tree ornament or a Christmas picture. And, since the whole point of Christmas decorations is to decorate, your children may be pleased to see their works of art hanging on your walls or on the Christmas tree. As a parent, that could, hands down, be the biggest reason why you should allow your kids to make their own Christmas decorations.
In addition to the pride that they will feel, you should also let your children make their own Christmas decorations because it should be a relatively easy and fun process. When it comes to making Christmas decorations, you will likely find that you have many of the craft supplies needed, already in your home. If not, you can easily purchase craft supplies, including Christmas supplies, from your local craft store or local dollar store. The supplies that you need to purchase don’t even just have to be for Christmas decorations. You can use the leftover supplies for other projects, if you choose to do so. That is one of the many reasons why having your children make their own Christmas decorations is cheaper than buying store bought ones.
Although this article had a focus on letting your children make their own Christmas decorations, you may want to join in the process as well. Not only can you give your children decoration ideas, especially young children, but you can also enjoy some quality time with each other. Christmas is all about family; therefore, by making Christmas decorations with your children, you and your family will be off to the right start, when celebrating Christmas. Whether you help out a little bit or make your own Christmas decorations, you and your children will likely enjoy the time that is being spent together.
Once the Christmas decorations have been made, whether they were made with your assistance or not, they will need to be displayed. When displaying your child’s homemade Christmas decorations, it is important that you give them time to dry, especially if paint or glue was used. This extra time will help to ensure that the hard work put into the decorations doesn’t go to waste. When the time is right, you and your child could spend the rest of the day or evening decorating your home for Christmas. What better way to end out the perfect day then letting your children help you hang their handmade treasures.
Christmas celebrations in African nations is characterized by
much outdoor activity because the season often occurs during a time
when the weather is pleasant. Using palm trees and participating in
processions are also characteristic features of activities related to
Christmas in many parts of Africa.
In South Africa, activities that occur outside during Christmas
include the usual caroling, but also the unusual ones of swimming and
camping. The beach and mountains play an important role during
Christmas in South Africa because the season occurs during the hottest
time of the year – summer.
Given the pleasant nature of the weather during Christmas,
families also take advantage of it by often going sightseeing in the
countryside on a relaxing drive in the late evening of Christmas Day. A
rich and sumptuous menu that includes a suckling pig or roast beef,
turkey, mince pies, yellow rice, vegetables and puddings usually makes
up the traditional South African Christmas dinner.
To create a festive environment, decorated pine branches and fir,
sparkling cotton wool and tinsel are used in homes and businesses as
decorations.
A similar decorative pattern of using evergreen, palm trees and
lighted candles are also seen in countries such as Ghana and Liberia.
While these are used in homes and businesses, they are also often
carried in processions and during caroling activities.
While South Africans gather at the beach during Christmas time to
enjoy the warm summer waters, people in other African nations often
gather outside at in town squares and in the streets to march, sing and
enjoy an overall feeling of merriment.
Despite the seemingly general similarity in activities, however,
countries have their own individual style that makes Christmas
celebrations unique.
Of all the celebrations in African nations, Christmas activities
in Ethiopia stand out for their difference in when they are celebrated
and how it is done. One of the features that make Ethiopian Christmas
different is that the main celebratory event occurs on Jan. 7, around
the time known as the Epiphany or Three Kings Day in North and South
America.
Given the general modest economic financial situations of a
significant number of the population in many African countries,
Christmas celebrations also tend to occur over a shorter period of
time, compared to activities in more wealthier countries.
Another difference in celebrations of Christmas in Ethiopia is
the participation of various people who take part in a pilgrimage and
converge on the capital city during Christmas Eve. These wanderers fill
the night air with a din of praying and chanting and create a
multicolor spectacle when they gather on Christmas morning to have a
religious service.
But retaining a similarity with other African nations, Ethiopians
enjoy a Christmas dinner that includes a meat stew. Stews, rice, root
vegetables such as yams, breads and soups often are part of the menu of
traditional Christmas day dinners in African nations.
Christmas dinners are likely enjoyed by families outside, where
everyone shares the meal while sitting in a circular pattern outside
under the shade of a sprawling tree, instead of sitting in a formal
setting at a table.
As is the practice in every household during Christmas, Africans
also exchange gifts. Popular items that are exchanged as Christmas
gifts include cotton cloth, soaps, sweets, pencils and books, all very
practical items that can be readily used. Again, this may be related to
the modest financial resources of up to half the population in many
African countries, as well as to cultural norms. Individuals aren’t
able to afford extravagant gifts but they still want to surprise
children, family and friends at Christmas with an unexpected gift. The
generally pervasive cultural norm of humility and modesty that exists
among traditional African peoples, also plays an important role in not
having overreaching extravagance at Christmas.
Every Thanksgiving, many of us set down in front of a feast featuring turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes and other delights. Interestingly, less than a month later we find ourselves in front of tables featuring a very similar meal in celebration of Christmas and other December holidays.
The traditional holiday meal is hard to beat, so it’s no wonder that we tend to repeat it. However, one might consider the advantages of doing something a little bit different for the December holidays. Although duplicating a popular menu may guarantee no one will walk away from the table hungry or dissatisfied, there are a host of other options one can pursue to reinvigorate the holiday feast.
Main courses can be varied considerably. Although few of us still dine on the traditional Christmas duck, it still presents a viable option. Hams, a staple of many family gatherings, is also an option. Options like these, however, only scratch the surface of available options. Have you ever considered a special lamb recipe for you holiday meal? Or, perhaps a feast centered upon a prime cut of beef? The options, really, are limited. Interestingly, there are many traditional holiday meals that are no longer in widespread use that feature alternatives to the somewhat tired common turkey or ham meals upon which we often rely. We can consider the menus enjoyed during the holidays by the people of other cultures and countries, too.
Side dishes offer a spectacular opportunity to elevate the holiday feast. There are many exciting alternatives to our traditional “potato and a vegetable” strategy. Tasty recipes make use of seasonal vegetables or can bring a touch of international flavor to your holiday plate. Instead of serving up the expected, one can supplement a great main course with inventive sides that will make the holiday meal a feast to remember.
Of course, the holidays are known for their sweets. Cookies, candies and pies are a significant part of most families’ holidays. There are literally thousands of ways to either supplement or replace commonly found holiday treats with something interesting, memorable and amazingly tasty! Any chef should consult collections of holiday recipes to find new ways to tantalize the taste buds of their guests.
One can supplement the holiday dinner with unique salads and soups, too. By adding even a few new touches to the holiday dining table, the event can be made even more special.
Imagine a table featuring an attractive array of interesting main courses and sides. The table could be based upon a theme—perhaps an “Italian Christmas” or “An Old European Chanukah.” Or, the meal could simply be an opportunity to explore a variety of new flavors and recipes. In any case, one can really reinvigorate the traditional holiday feast and produce a family event that will long be remembered.
We all love our traditional Thanksgiving dinners. Apparently, we love it enough to often do it all over again a month later! Repeating that traditional feast is unlikely to disappoint most of those gathered around the dinner table. However, it is possible to add something to remember to the December holidays by experimenting with alternative menus and/or adding new dishes and experiences to the table.
Making a great Christmas dinner doesn’t always mean finding a good turkey and making enough potatoes. It can be something different, fun, and tasty. You may be able to develop your own family holiday food traditions by experimenting with something new. All one needs to reinvigorate the holiday feast is a willingness to do something new and to review a strong collection of fantastic holiday recipes.
We all love the holidays and want to them to be a truly enjoyable and rewarding experience. As a result, we tend to spend a great deal of time and effort engaging in various activities trying to make the time period extra special. Our desire to have the best holidays possible often delivers a result more ironic than O’Henry’s Gift of the Magi. Instead of enjoying the holiday season, we spend it in stress, worrying about how to make our holidays perfect.
One of the chief causes of holiday stress is that gnawing feeling that the things you must do are going to outstrip your available time. Shopping, cooking, packing, wrapping and decorating suddenly fill what used to be your free time. Special holiday events and parties may begin to pepper your schedule, too. You fear being the crazed shopper banging on closed shop doors on Christmas Eve or are certain you will be forced to take the family out for a Chinese dinner because there is simply no way to get everything done!
There are many great resources providing quality hints and tips to reduce holiday stress, and if you feel yourself experiencing a great deal of pressure in December, you should definitely find some of these materials and consider the myriad of great ideas to make your winters easier. In addition to the many great suggestions these sources provide, there are a few basic steps you can take to make your to-do list seem more manageable and to reduce your stress level.
Adjust Your Expectations
Some may benefit from simply readjusting their expectations of the holidays. The omnipresent media and advertising industries can lead us to believe that any holiday celebration that doesn’t end up resembling a Currier & Ives print is a failure. This, of course, is not the case. It’s fine to strive for a wonderful holiday season, but it’s not necessary to create the Perfect Holiday. Instead of concerning yourself with every Christmas detail, you can reduce your stress level by focusing on the parts of the holidays that are most meaningful and important to you and placing less emphasis on other aspects of the season.
By readjusting your expectations and goals for the holidays, you can reduce time pressures considerably. A focus on what matters most to you insures that you will not spend precious hours involving yourself in activities and projects that are really not part of your “core” holiday goals.
Start Early
We often laugh at the fact Christmas decorations tend to go up in shopping malls right after Halloween decorations disappear. Although we don’t necessarily need to take the not-so-subtle message of holiday commercialization to heart, we can learn a little bit something from the early decoration trend. By starting our holiday preparations early, we can reduce the amount of pressure and stress we experience during the holiday season.
It may seem unusual, but it really is okay to check whether or not the Christmas lights are working before the day you plan on decorating. And there’s no reason you can’t spend a little idle time in November doing a big of holiday shopping. By doing some of your “required” tasks early, you can avoid the feeling of being in a rush in late December.
Follow Santa’s Lead
Santa Claus, the song tells us, makes a list and checks it twice. If he left delivery of millions of toys up to his memory, he would probably be the North Pole’s most stressed resident. You can learn an important lesson from Santa Claus and can create your own organized list of holiday tasks and chores.
Although you may not want to over-regulate yourself, it is a good idea to make a pretty detailed list of everything you’ll need to do in preparation for the holidays. If you can produce this list early, you will be able to schedule out events in a reasonable manner, making sure you are not caught up in the hustle and bustle that makes the holidays so frustrating for some people.
The holidays can be a source of great satisfaction and enjoyment. Unfortunately, they can also become a high-pressure race for those who are not adequately prepared. By carefully assessing your holiday needs and expectations, starting early on the holidays and keeping an organized to-do list, you can make your holidays a pleasure!
Picking out the perfect holiday gifts from friends and acquaintances can be a very difficult chore. Choosing the right item for everyone can be very difficult—especially when finding items for those you may not know particularly well. Additionally, thinly stretched holiday budgets are often unable to handle a series of quality gifts.
Santa Claus, of course, doesn’t experience these problems. He has an army of elves who are willing to build gifts for him out of the goodness of their hearts and he owns his own top-of-the-line gift factory.
By turning your kitchen into a holiday gift factory you can find a way to give personal, quality gifts to everyone. These homemade gifts can be produced inexpensively and use equipment you already have!
A nice tray of homemade candies, holiday cookies and treats can be a perfect present. Everyone, after all, enjoys eating. This means you can be sure to generate gifts that will truly be appreciated. The fact that you have made your gift trays with your own hands also adds a unique personal touch to your presents that an item grabbed off a store shelf could never capture. Additionally, the process of making the items can be fun and relaxing, giving you an opportunity to enjoy the holidays.
So, with what can you fill your holiday gift trays? There are, of course, the old reliables: frosted and decorated simple sugar cookies, gingerbread men, and fudge. The recipient will greet any of these traditional holiday confections with a smile.
Many of those who make holiday gifts from their own kitchen truly enjoy providing others with a selection of their own family recipes, adding special personal touch to the gift. This approach to producing holiday edibles is sure to be a success.
However, expanding one’s culinary horizons and producing taste treats that will surprise and delight recipients can produce a truly unforgettable holiday gift.
One can add a great deal of dimension to their holiday gift giving by seeking out new and unique recipes to supplement family traditions and traditional favorites. By finding recipes for interesting holiday confections and cookies, one can create a truly spectacular holiday gift basket or cookie tray that will long be remembered.
One can mix and match recipes to build a colorful and tasty variety of treats. Exposing gift recipients to an interesting array of new tastes will not only provide them with a great gift, it will also show them that a great deal of thought and consideration was put into their treats.
Consider making cookies popular in different regions of the world for an internationally themed holiday tray. Several treats can be produced themed on a single ingredient, to display the many ways a particular flavor can be used in cooking. One can opt to simply create a smorgasbord of awesome cookies designed to delight all of the senses without centering on a particular theme. The options are limited.
You may not own your own toy factory atop the North Pole or have a team of elves ready to do your bidding. However, you can easily transform your kitchen and cooking skills into a home-based gift factory that produces fantastic presents for everyone. Unforgettable holiday treats can add enjoyment to anyone’s holidays and are far less expensive to produce than searching the aisles of retail stores for a series of drab gifts. All you need to transform your home into a spectacular holiday gift factory is a little time and a great collection of holiday recipes.
There are many techniques for improving your holidays. If you don’t believe it, just take a look at the advertising circulars in your Sunday newspaper or take a quick television advertising tour.
The perfect toy will make your child happy and will fill you with the joy of Christmas. A new set of bargain priced indoor-outdoor Christmas lights will make you the envy of the neighborhood and will give you a warm sense of holiday satisfaction. Christmas, the jewelers tell us, won’t really be complete unless that special woman receives the gift that lasts forever (and takes nearly as long to pay off). Even the simple notion of purchasing a holiday greeting card is imbued with heightened significance. Tear jerking commercials remind us just how important it is to buy the name brand cards if we really want to communicate our feelings for loved ones during the holiday season.
It is no wonder holiday stress has reached epidemic proportions. We receive message after message telling us just how important every single thing we buy and do is with respect to having a good holiday season. Simultaneously, we are bombarded with reminders that this is the most important time of the year. Confronted with these messages, we look for a way out. We look for a way to capture that elusive sense of holiday satisfaction—often with a wad of cash or a credit card.
There’s nothing wrong with spending within your means to have an enjoyable holiday. It is, after all, a time of giving and a time of celebration and some level of cost is probably inevitable. No one should begrudge another for buying that holiday diamond or eschewing cut-rate greeting cards. However, there are ways to increase your enjoyment of the holidays without spending one extra dime.
One great piece of holiday wisdom is the simple reminder to “think about ideas and people instead of things.” Even the most free-spending Christmas shopper, when asked, will tell you that the holidays are a time to reflect on the messages of the season and to spend time with loved ones. The spirit of the holidays can be transmitted by proxy in the form of a shiny toy or even shinier ring, but the message is actually more clearly communicated by a simple hug or a quality conversation.
Too often, we use things as our means of expression instead of using ourselves. By retaining a focus on people and ideas instead of things, we find can begin to really communicate the message of love that underlies everyone’s understanding of the holidays. A hug, a conversation or a walk around the block with a loved one doesn’t cost a dime and can be the best way to build holiday cheer, pleasant memories, and an appreciation of the holidays.
Another free means by which you can enjoy the holidays more is by making a contribution of time to a cause you support. There is absolutely nothing wrong with making financial or material contributions to charities. In fact, those contributions are entirely necessary for most charitable organizations to stay afloat and are also a great way to celebrate the holidays. However, giving of yourself can really make the holidays matter and add a dimension to your appreciation of the holiday season.
Volunteering one’s time and energy to a charitable cause can increase one’s appreciation of the holidays and allows them to truly embody the spirit of giving that underpins the season. These simple acts of kindness can be truly transformative—not only for those who benefit from the gift but also for those who are willing to volunteer.
If you want another strand of Christmas lights and they fit into your budget, go ahead. Feel free to pick up that great toy for your child and the expensive knick-knack for your spouse. Buy only the best wrapping paper, if you so desire. If you feel like you can improve your holiday season with a few purchases, you can go ahead and try.
However, you should also remember that there are a few things you can do that won’t cost you a bit that can really increase the quality of your holiday season. Remember to think about people and ideas—instead of things. Consider volunteering your time and effort to a worthwhile cause, too. Simple things like these can improve a holiday more than any gadget or gift.
When one suffers a lack of perspective, it said that he or she might be unable to “see the forest through the trees.” In other words, their attention to small parts may prevent them from gaining an understanding of the whole. It is possible to get too bogged down in details and to allow the mind to exaggerate their importance. When it comes to the holidays, there are many of us who have a hard time seeing the bigger picture and it can lead to a great deal of stress.
By becoming too focused on smaller parts of the holiday experience, we lose track of the greater meaning of the season and create highly stressful situations. There are some of us, for instance, who may spend hours obsessing over outdoor holiday decorations. Are those lights right? Is that figure in its proper place? Etc. It’s find to take pride in one’s holiday decorations, of course, but it is possible to become so focused on the perfect display and to become so frustrated at the process that one begins to lose track of how that one aspect of the season fits into the bigger picture.
Another example, and one to which many of us can relate, is gift shopping. The idea of freely giving to others during the holidays should be a source of fun and joy. Too often, however, it degrades into a trying and frustrating exercise. The simple act of giving somehow becomes a high-pressure activity that seems to consume us. Instead of enjoying this one component of the holidays, we allow it to consume a disproportionate amount of our attention and consideration. Finding the “perfect gift” becomes an intense process, devoid of pleasure.
The problem, in both instances, is the same. We lose track of the holiday forest as we become single-mindedly focused on one Christmas tree. We begin to see each part of holiday preparation and every aspect of holiday activities as ends in and of themselves, as opposed to small means to the greater end of a pleasurable holiday.
This loss of perspective is one of the greatest causes of holiday stress. We begin to believe that successful completion of every single holiday task or challenge is integral to having a successful Christmas. Every single part of the equation, from wreath hanging to making an extra pie is perceived as a matter of great importance. Not surprisingly, we find ourselves jumping from project to project in a state of high stress. Somewhere, amidst all of those individual tasks, we lose track of the essence of the holidays completely.
Some may argue that each step along the way is important. Perhaps, to some extent every little thing we do does have the chance to improve our holidays. However, if we reflect on Christmases past, we generally don’t remember the small mistakes or tiny incorrect details. Do you remember if every strand of lights on the tree were in perfect synchronicity on your favorite past holiday? Can you ever remember a year when the holiday dinner was completely ruined by one burned dish? Have you ever felt a holiday was ruined by a poor gift-wrapping job? Generally, those smaller features—the individual trees of the Christmas forest—are far less important in building holiday memories than interactions between people.
By stepping back when we begin to feel stressed about any part of the holidays and trying to visualize the overall holiday forest, we can reduce our stress levels considerably. A sense of perspective allows us to realize that correcting a somewhat sloppy gift-wrapping job is not the highest of our priorities or essential to a great Christmas. By seeing the full forest instead of giving our attention to individual trees we are better able to relax, enjoy and celebrate the season.
If you start to feel particularly stressed this holiday season, take a moment to ask yourself whether the source of your stress is really an issue of great importance. Try to visualize your holidays as a whole instead of focusing on the single matter at hand. Chances are that a bit of perspective will allow you to relax and enjoy the season a bit more.
Every holiday season, many of us look forward to eating special treats made using long-held and cherished family recipes. Many families have holiday food traditions they hold dear. There are those who cannot imagine a holiday without Grandma’s date pinwheel cookies or Great Uncle Peter’s cornbread stuffing. Year after year, we enjoy these treats and use them as a way to stay connected with our families and personal histories.
More than mere sustenance, the traditional foods we enjoy year after year are a source of family pride and lead to conversations about family members and fond memories of holidays past. Family food traditions can be one of the most important parts of the holiday season for many people.
There was once, however, a time in each and every family history before those recipes existed. Grandma had to make those date pinwheel cookies for the first time. When she did, she may have placed them right next to sugar cookies made with her Grandma’s secret recipe, having no idea they would become such an integral part of the holiday. Great Uncle Peter’s cornbread stuffing only came about because Great Aunt Beth was sick years ago and he had to come up with some way to stuff a bird himself on Christmas morning. His reliance on a simple recipe card with a few personal touches started a family tradition, too. Grandma and Great Uncle Peter didn’t intent to create a longstanding tradition that generation after generation would enjoy. They simply hoped that they could add a little bit to the holiday meal by doing something different.
The holiday food traditions to which we now look forward were the byproducts of experimentation. The creators of the original dishes may have never intended to make them again. They just happened to feel like doing something different or adding something new to the holiday table.
Holiday food traditions are special to many of us, and it is wonderful to experience those comforting recipes each and every holiday. It’s a great idea, however, to remember how those traditions began. By realizing the source of those traditions, we can be spurred to create our own.
This holiday season consider doing something new. Think about adding a different plate to the dinner or treat table. Make a side dish not generally found on your holiday table or produce a cookie with which you are not familiar. Try a few new ideas and see what happens. Some of the new notions may not be universally well received. Others may be enjoyed, but not to the extent of your family’s holiday classics. One, however, might receive such rave reviews that you decide to try it again next year.
Over time, that simple decision to experiment may turn into part of your family’s traditional holiday table. The new cookie recipe you find in a holiday recipe collection this year may eventually become a staple item that your great-grandchildren cannot imagine missing.
Traditions are important and enjoyable. They form part of the essence of one’s family. Wouldn’t it be nice to add your generation’s mark to the food traditions you all hold so dear? Inventing new holiday traditions has no precise formula. One cannot really intentionally “design” a new holiday food tradition. They tend to grow over time. However, new traditions do require a willingness to prepare an inventive new dish. This holiday season, consider your potential role as a creator of a meaningful holiday tradition and add something new to the holiday feast.
