Cindy MacDougall: Baby Makes Six.
My mother makes good old St. Nick look like a rum-and-nog-drinking procrastinator. She starts buying her Christmas gifts for the next year on Boxing Day. She is usually finished shopping by September, and has everything wrapped, mailed and delivered by mid-November.
I am the ultimate last-minute Christmas shopper. You can usually see me gently shoving husbands and fathers out of my way in the last few shopping days before Christmas, hoping all the good stuff is not gone.
I used to argue Christmas shopping before Advent just seemed wrong; Christmas should be confined to the Advent and Christmas seasons and not stretched out over two months, like a holiday version of the song that never ends.
But that was when my husband, Clayton, did most of the toy shopping for Christmas. This year, he has been deployed with the Navy for two and a half months, and just arrived home yesterday. With that long absence just before Christmas, I knew I couldn’t put it off this year.
I set a goal for myself: I would have everything bought and all the out-of-town gifts wrapped and mailed by the time Clayton arrived. Instead, I was officially done Christmas shopping, right down to stocking stuffers and Christmas baking, more than a week before my deadline.
I still have to wrap most of the gifts (and I may never get the Christmas cards out), but other than that, I’m ready. My mom may never get over the shock of me calling her on Dec. 6 and saying, “I mailed your package. It will be there well before Christmas!”
I started the planning stages a few days after Halloween. I asked my kids to submit a list, in writing, before Nov. 15, with three things they’d like, and some alternatives, warning them they would not get most of the things on the list. The older kids also told me what our littlest guy, Eddie, had exclaimed over when he saw toy commercials.
I finally embraced online shopping. I’ve bought lots of things on the Internet for more than a decade, but generally it’s stuff I couldn’t get in a store where I live. This time, though, I was home alone with four small kids, and couldn’t drag them along to buy gifts for them. If I could get it delivered for free, I bought it online.
I did my local shopping during my lunch hour as much as I could, making lists and mapping out excursions.
I have found I spent slightly more money on Christmas this year than past years, but that the spending is more tolerable, since it was spread over several paycheques. I also found I could buy better gifts cheaper, thanks to the creep of Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales into Canada.
The big surprise, though, is how much I am enjoying Advent this year. I usually scrape through, remembering my Advent wreath and candles (a Catholic tradition) sometime between the second and third Sundays of Advent. Helping others also falls off the table as I desperately hunt for gifts.
This year, I had my Advent wreath ready. I’ve helped organize donations for a Christmas hamper, and have talked to my kids about a service project.
Last weekend, as my older boys rolled cookies in icing sugar, we talked about the birth of Jesus, and why we give each other gifts. We talked about Jesus’s probable birth date, and why the church moved the date to mid-winter. We talked about Christmas trees and yule logs and the meaning of the virgin birth. Instead of rushing around getting ready for Christmas, I was preparing for the holiday where it counts — down deep in my heart. And they were, too.
Next year, I start shopping in October.
