Comments on: 11 Ways to Stop the Holiday Want Monsters and Shift Your Focus

By: Melissa Taylor

Melissa Taylor — Sun, 15 Dec 2013 19:00:28 +0000

In reply to Hallie Doyle. sure - we're all in this together!

By: Hallie Doyle

Hallie Doyle — Wed, 11 Dec 2013 21:49:00 +0000

GREAT post, Melissa! In those moments of being tired, it’s so much easier to just let it all happen to us instead of being intentional! I appreciate knowing that others have grappled with this. Thanks for getting the conversation going and sharing these great ideas!

By: Melissa Taylor

Melissa Taylor — Tue, 10 Dec 2013 19:20:00 +0000

In reply to Debra Carr. thanks, Debra.

By: Melissa Taylor

Melissa Taylor — Tue, 10 Dec 2013 19:20:00 +0000

In reply to Brandy Lane. it does get expensive! I love your idea of family time. :)

By: Melissa Taylor

Melissa Taylor — Tue, 10 Dec 2013 19:20:00 +0000

In reply to Jennifer Fischer. I did, thanks for inviting me and for your suggestions! :)

By: Debra Carr

Debra Carr — Mon, 09 Dec 2013 18:43:00 +0000

The power of advertising!!! My 3 year old actually asked if he could have a Sat Nav for Christmas the other day.

I certainly think emphasising the giving aspect of Christmas is the way forward and they enjoy it too: posting cards, baking biscuits etc. We went to get new shoes today and the shop we go to runs a scheme where they take your children’s old shoes and give them to children who don’t have any. I was very proud to see how willing my son was to give his ones away.

I’m loving the idea of writing a list of gifts that they think others would like, I’m definitely going to do this one with my son.

By: Brandy Lane

Brandy Lane — Fri, 06 Dec 2013 22:56:00 +0000

Another thing you might want to think about is instead of “gifts” which inevitably are tossed aside after a few weeks (or even days) or grown out of, what about giving the gift of culture and learning? I am a mother of 4, and let me tell you, it gets expensive buying Lego’s and Monster High dolls, so this year, we are going to have the children pick 2 places that they would like a family membership to (a children’s museum, zoo, museum of nature and science or an aquarium) and purchase those instead of a ton of “gifts”. This is a gift that we can use as a family (yeah!! Family time!!) that will get us out of the house and away from the life sucking technology that surrounds us!! With exhibits that change, it is the perfect gift for year round, something to do on rainy days and something that we can discuss!! 🙂

By: Jennifer Fischer

Jennifer Fischer — Thu, 05 Dec 2013 21:07:00 +0000

I love this post and know that other families feel the same way. We recently realized our focus on presence, giving (to others) and family time during the holiday season truly works. My husband is taking photos of kids with Santa this weekend asked my 4 year-old son if he wanted to go only to realize that he doesn’t really even have an understanding of who Santa is and that his interests at Christmas are focused on decorations. Something else that helps a lot is that our only TV service for the kids is Netflix – commercial free! I’d love it if you would link this post up to A Season of Giving: 31 Days of Spreading Joy, a wonderful blog hop put together by Kids Stuff World: http://jennifischer.blogspot.com/2013/12/ten-for-givingtuesday-ten-ways-to-kick.html – Thanks again for sharing our thoughts!