The Gift of December

by Terri

It’s the day after Christmas and all through the house . . . and as a friend said to me last week, "I'm ready for Christmas, I'm just not ready for Christmas to be over." Those were my sentiments exactly! I hope your day was merry and bright and today you are relaxing with feelings of peace and joy.

In my last post at the end of November I talked about how I wanted to simplify things this holiday season and focus on the things that brought the most joy.  As the month of December began, I got so much inspiration from my fellow blogmates. Carol’s post about a different way of decorating really spoke to me. I chose to decorate with only those things that made me happy.  The rest will stay in their boxes this year. I have to say, I love the simpler decorations (and it will be so much easier to put them away next week!)

 

I followed Cathy’s lead and spent some time outside with my camera during the month. And Judy’s post helped me focus on the gifts Mother Nature provides. There is nothing more calming than being out in nature. We have had some beautiful December weather and I really wanted to be outside enjoying it. The benefits were being able to slow things down, focus on the beauty around me and play which helped offset the crazy busyness of this time of year. 

Sunrise is something I see only in the middle of winter (it just comes up too early the rest of the year!) so I made sure to enjoy it and capture it with my camera.

And Leigh’s post about giving the gift of time should have been required reading for everybody this December. The gift of togetherness in the midst of all the crazy buying, wrapping, etc. is the perfect gift, for ourselves and for our families. My husband and I made sure to be at every one of our grandson’s basketball games this month. Seeing the smile on his face when he greeted us after the game was all I needed to tell me the gift of time was well worth it. And, yes, at 15 he’s already this much taller than I am!

And, of course, we continued the tradition of Porter girls’ shopping day with my two little 5-year-old granddaughters:

And something new this year was a trip with these little beauties to the American Girl doll store for breakfast with Santa.

In this photo they are holding “borrowed” dolls that they were given to have breakfast with. However, after breakfast I surprised them and we went into the store where they picked out their first American Girl dolls for Mimi and Grandpa to give them for Christmas. I have never seen such huge smiles!  There was a pretty big one on my face as well. 

This December I gave a gift to myself as well by giving myself simplicity, quiet time in nature and family togetherness. I’d say December was a complete success! 

And I can’t leave you without saying how grateful I am to not only all of my fellow collaborators but to you, our readers. You are what keep us going. We will be celebrating our fifth anniversary in January and we couldn’t do it without you. Here’s to many more stories to tell and photos to share. So glad to have you along for the ride!