Has Christmas lost its true meaning

If you take a look around you at all all the stuff in the shops for Christmas you would think that Jesus was born so we could stuff our faces with buy two for a tenner tubs of chocolates.    When did massive packets of everything signify Christmas?  Nothing says “Joy to the World” quite like a yard of Crunchie, does it?

I am not a particularly religious person and I don’t have young children anymore so Christmas for me looms large at the end of the calendar as “Oh flipping heck, do we have to?”.    It fills me with more dread than cheer.    A wise person once said “It’s only a roast dinner with a cracker” and I wish I could hold on to that and believe it.

This year however is going to be different.   We are off this year to embrace what Christmas should really be about.  Being a family.   Taking time off, and time out and regrouping as a family.   My immediate family is not huge, really just my folks and my granny as my mum and I are both only children.  And Bruce’s parents.    So it is important for us to spend Christmas together if possible.

It’s always a bit hurried though, driving to spend an afternoon with people and watching the clock or worrying about the traffic is never relaxing, is it?  And then there is the usual problem of who is going to drive.  It all adds more stress to the whole thing.

And we have had quite a stressful year with one thing and another.   My granny has been poorly and has had a couple of stays in hospital.  We haven’t been able to see as much of Mr B’s folks as we would have liked as they are the other end of the country.  Or indeed my parents.  Plus we are on the cusp of our family dynamic changing as C is more and settled with her boyfriend and probably about to move out of our house and into their own flat.

This Christmas therefore needs to be a special one.   Needs to focus on the important stuff, like all waking up together on Christmas morning, falling asleep after a big Christmas dinner, not having to disappear just as Downton Abbey comes on the TV.   So we are all going to be together this year.   Eleven of us in a holiday cottage that my parents have rented down in Cornwall (and before you think about burgling our house, we have house sitters) for a whole week.   My parents, my granny, Mr B’s parents, all three teens and C’s boyfriend are off to spend a week together concentrating on the important things, like being a family.

Mr B is in charge of doing a quiz on Boxing Day and I am in charge of cooking the turkey having had my masterclass with Marco Pierre White .    I have also decided to be in charge (you know me, I like to be in charge) of making sure the holiday cottage is decorated to the max.  I am sure they will provide us with a few things and possibly even a tree but I don’t want to take any chances so have got myself some tea lights and holders from “lights4fun” for the table on Christmas day to brighten things up a bit.   After all, we have to have a table groaning in glasses, cutlery and crackers, don’t we?!

And I have also just bought a pre-lit Christmas tree.  Shhh don’t tell Mr B.   There is always an argument about lights not working  or not being long enough and I can’t face it this year.    Even if we have been provided with a tree I am sure we can find a spot for another one!

I just need to work out now how to get it all in the car.  Oops.

This post is a PR collaboration with Lights4Fun