When we were kids, my brother and I knew Christmas was coming, because my Mom put up the Christmas tree on the first Saturday in November.  Friends and relatives who didn’t follow her tradition of early decorating mocked her and I half-heartedly agreed.  As a teenager I thought it was amusing, but I didn’t really care, either way.  I was pretty much indifferent to the whole season, aside from the excitement of receiving presents, that is.

Now that I’m an adult, I find that Christmas is my favourite time of year.  I start getting excited around the first couple of weeks in November.  I look forward to the decorations, carols, and food.  But it wasn’t always like that for me – I learned very young that Santa was a hoax and my happy world of Christmas make-believe never was quite the same.  I always wanted to believe in magic, but didn’t get that hopeful, joyful, goodwill-towards-man feeling back until I was a young adult.

My husband and I got married almost three and a half years ago, and we now have a daughter who is two and a half.  Our first two Christmases as a family, we spent different days with different families and dinners.  It didn’t really bother us that much, because we followed a pagan tradition of recognizing Yule on December 21st.  But that has changed (for me, anyway), because since last Christmas I’ve re-connected with my Christian beliefs.  That has made things difficult between my husband and I, to say the least – but that’s not what this story is about.

When my daughter was born, we knew we wanted to have our own special traditions for the holidays.  Her first Christmas/Yule, we got her a “2008” ornament and gave it to her on Yule, so it could be hung on the tree until New Years.  Last year, we got her a “2009” ornament in addition to a really cool spider ornament made from an old stereo amp tube (purchased off Etsy).  We plan on giving her one “year” ornament and one cool/unique/fun ornament every year so that when she’s grown and goes out on her own, we can gift her with her box of ornaments for her very own tree.

This year is the first year that our daughter will really understand that it’s Christmas.  I’m eagerly anticipating the day when our neighbours start decorating their yards and homes with string lights and blow-up dioramas.  She got so excited over Halloween decorations, I can’t wait to see the look on her face as we see how people go all-out for Christmas.

Now that our girl is a little older, we hope to actually spend Christmas day alone as a family, just the three of us.  Running around from house to house just to do the obligatory family visits kind of takes the fun out of the holidays, don’t you think?  I would much rather do the visiting spread over a week or so, rather than do it all in one or two days.  And eating four turkey dinners in two days isn’t recommended either – been there, done that.  Blech.

So does wanting to be alone with my family make me a bad person?  I’m sure some of my relatives will think I’m being selfish or rude – but you know what?  I don’t really care.  Because if you don’t get to spend time with your closest family – spouse and child(ren) on Christmas, what’s the point?