And so it begins

Well actually it doesn’t begin now, some of it starts in January.

“Done my Christmas shopping in the January sales.   Saved loads of money”

Oh give over.   I can’t even begin to discuss that one.

The rest of it starts in about August as the bigger shops clear away all the summer furniture the Christmas displays start.   Things start creeping into the house.   Lists get written.   Piles appear on the spare bed.

Well not in this house.   Here we are, start of December and not a thing done for Christmas.

We have 12 for Christmas lunch.  The table is folded and safely stored in the garage, I am assuming it will seat 12, if it doesn’t, some of us will be using trays and sitting on the floor.    The chairs for the table are in a friend’s garage as she is lending them to us.

Cards, well we don’t send many, in fact in previous years we didn’t send any but this year we have some personalised ones to send out.  They will get written and will then probably sit in a handbag undiscovered until January.

Presents.   The teens just want cash, so I am going to give them cash.   They will have their stockings from Father Christmas (via Firebox or IWOOT or some such other website highly recommended by Father Christmas) but we don’t go massively over board.   And if anybody comes to my house expecting a gift tag.   Yeah, well you can forget that.   It will either be in a pile that means I know it is for you.  Or it will have your name written on it in biro.   On Christmas Eve.

The food?  Well I guess at some point we have to order a turkey and ham from the farm shop up the road, either that or we will be in Iceland on Christmas Eve buying a frozen Bernard Matthews bird and defrosting it in the bath overnight.    We have a delivery slot booked with Waitrose for 22nd December but if I dont clear out the trolley (you have to put £90 in to secure the slot) of 18 packs of breaded prawns and 24 stilton filled vol au vents by December 20th and add what it is we do want that will be the sum total of our Christmas food.

And do you know what?  I don’t care.  I seriously, honestly, couldn’t care less.   Full blown month long panic about not having done stuff is just not me.    There will be somewhere to sit come the 25th, there will be food of some sort, there will be presents.

There will be booze, oh so much booze.   There will be family.   Four generations, from both sides of the family, all under one roof for days at a time.   What else matters?

I can’t begin to imagine having stuff bought, wrapped and gift tags added, sitting around from now onwards.   I genuinely have NO idea what I am getting for ANYBODY let alone bought it and wrapped it.   Teens are easy, but the rest of my family?  Nada.  Not a clue.

I had a conversation with some lovely ladies on Twitter today who asked who had finished their shopping:

And I just can’t do it.   Is it because I don’t have young children?  Am I just old?

Don’t get me wrong, I am not anti Christmas, far from it.  I love Christmas.  I just don’t get the need to be super organised a month in advance and to be stressed if things are not done (Jo this is no way a dig at you, you just happen to be the person I talked to today, there have been loads before today). 

 In the grand scheme of things it is just a roast dinner with a cracker.   Isn’t it?