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It’s Christmas Day … and according to everything we read, see and hear, we should all be completely exhausted!

According to the popular version of mums at Christmas time, we should all have been spending months shopping for gifts, weeks planning the menu for the big day and the last week getting the house ‘Christmas ready’.

We’ve got wreaths at the door, the house is spotless, the kids are all playing happily by the tree and everyone is bustling ’round the house to the Christmassy aromas of gingerbread baking and fruit mince bubbling.

Very big shoes to fill I say.

Because I don’t know about you but even if I did aspire to this ideal, I’ve never once in my 22 years of being married and 13 years being a mum managed to pull it off – I don’t ever come close.  Christmas time for me is usually a mad race to the finish line.  The finish line I end up cursing and asking why we all have to have this one day in the calendar that is SO FULL OF EXPECTATION.

Whether it’s true or not, I feel as though everyone expects we’ll spend the day with them – but because of distance, the cost of travel and the fact our house is too small to cope with more than two visitors at a time, this can’t happen. So we spend our lives alternating between families and feeling guilty if we even think about planning a Christmas that might not include them.  I’m fairly sure they would understand but again, it’s my own set of expectations playing on my mind.

And as wrong as it is, everything my kids read, see, hear and have been exposed to, creates an expectation of a big pile of gifts under the Christmas tree. And knowing this, I spend the month leading up to Christmas stressing over how much money I will spend. And even if I could afford to go crazy and splash out, I wouldn’t. I find it all a bit scary that so much is invested into one day.  By the time each of my children get even a small gift from each set of grandparents, one gift from Santa, one gift from us, one gift from each other (we’re trying to get them to think of their siblings instead of just their own wish list) and their one from Aunt, Uncle and cousins, the present pile is significant.  Their gift stash is logical – one gift per gift givee with a dollar limit, but I do still think it’s too much.  I worry they have no concept of how much everything costs and I worry when I hear them tell me what sorts of gifts the children at school are receiving!

As I said, it’s my own set of expectations that leave me worrying more about what I’m supposed to be doing, cooking, thinking and feeling.  So this year I’m binning my expectations and I’m going to find peace.

And PEACE with your situation is my wish for you too.

I’m going to find peace with the fact that Christmas lunch won’t look like a magazine photo shoot, peace that I don’t look like I could be in said photo shoot, peace with the fact that my kids will probably fight with each other and that my hubby will sleep on the couch after lunch instead of joining in with the boardgame. If this is my biggest issue, I need to get a grip.  There are a million people today who have splintered families who will not be together today or any day.

If this is you, my wish for you is peace. A peace that will enable you to get through the day and look ahead to better times.

I’m going to find peace with the fact that for the last 11 Christmas Days, my second son has not been here.  He died when he was 17 months old and I miss him everyday but of course more keenly on days like this. I could rage at the universe and ask why he is not here but I know there are thousands of mums out there just like me who mourn their children today and every day.

If this is you, my wish for you is to be able to find a moment in your day to find peace. A peace where you can connect with the memory of your child and hold them close – if only in your mind.

I’m going to find peace with the fact that my Dad died way too soon of an illness that left him disconnected from everything for years before he died. Like my son, I’ll find a moment in the day to connect with him – I’ll remember him through my own teenage eyes – wearing a crazy Christmas cracker hat while he carves the ham and playing water volleyball with us all Christmas Day afternoon!

If, like me you are mourning other family members, my wish for you is peace. A peace that allows you to know that they will always be in your heart.

I could go on and on but you get the jist.  The fact is there won’t be a perfect Christmas Day anywhere today.  Well not perfect as in what we’re told Christmas Day should be. But the perfect Christmas Days will be those where there is peace, love, acceptance and gratefulness.

I’m not going to say Merry Christmas – too many expectations.

I’m going to say LOVE, HUGS and a PEACEFUL Christmas to you all.

May peace be your gift at Christmas and your blessing the whole year through.

Much love,

Nikki (Founder of MoM & Mum of 4)

 

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  • Loved reading your thoughts on Xmas!

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  • Me and Sally the day

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  • nice

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  • I loved this article, it really puts the day into perspective.

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  • Christmas to me is all about family. Especially now I have a baby! As I get older I realise how precious and short life is and christmas is another time to truly appreciate those I love!

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  • I wish the sence of peace and goodwill was here all year not just at christmas

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  • yeah i had the party but we did a bbq and kept it low key and it was suprisingly just fun! i thought that i would have to play full on hostess but it wasn’t too bad!

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  • Thanks for sharing, Christmas can definitely be a stressful time of year with all the expectations we place on ourselves.

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  • exceptional gift to win,a great way to connect with friends,loved ones those that reside in Australia and overseas.

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  • We seem to plan in advance but for some reason don’t carry out those plans until the last minute and always end up in a rush. This year I was at peace that not everything arrived, that we didn’t get to have the perfect showcase Christmas. I focused on the fact that I was with my family and I was grateful for what we had rather than focusing on what we didn’t. It was the best Christmas ever.

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  • Thanks Nikki for sharing your wishes for peace. We have had news of three people passing away in the weeks before Christmas this year and my hopes for those families is that they could still get some joy from the day with their loved ones although it will be a sad time for them. Then yesterday, I heard that a girl in my daughter’s class at school lost her mum to cancer yesterday, and my tears flowed for her and her sister. I was so thankful this year that we could have a Christmas with our whole family for the first time in three years, and it definitely wasn’t perfect, but in another way it was because we were all there. I’ll always be thankful for that.

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  • Thank you for sharing your heartfelt journey with us Nikki and I pray you had a blessed and beautiful Christmas. We have a beautiful and very special table cloth we use on Christmas Day, it has all our names embroidered on it as well as the names of our loved family members that have passed on. We also have a candle for each passed loved one with their picture on it. I miss each one dearly but my heart aches for my much loved god son /nephew who is with his grandparents now awaiting the day till we all are united again. Much love and hugs to all.

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  • I enjoyed the fact that many families made the effort to all be together at the same time. If everybody contributed some food or drinks ,it would make it less stressful for the host family. That is what we have always done. Some take salads, some fruit, some platters, some take sliced meats and others desserts.

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  • We did have a peaceful Christmas this year, for once, it was lovely. Hope you did too Niki, thanks for sharing. :)

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  • Thanks for sharing your story; we always toast our loved ones present and sadly gone physically; but forever in our hearts. Sorry for your losses; hopefully you find some peace. I too; wish everyone a safe and peaceful Christmas period and New year; cherishing and nurturing the important things in life.

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  • Thank you for a wonderful, poignant and honest piece of writing and for sharing a bit of your Christmas journey with us

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  • Just beautiful comments, an honest option of how so many of us feel. Wishing everyone the peace and happiness in 2015 they deserve.

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  • Something to truly think about, I hope after your beautiful words you have had a truly peaceful Christmas. I know after putting a lot of expectations aside in my mind this year and holding on to my most important things the spirit of Christmas was certainly in our house.

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  • I have absolutely no expectations of Christmas anymore, we don’t do anything special for it or anything.

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  • Such beautiful words and ones I needed to read today, thank you so much for all you have written

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