Simplifying Christmas...

I love buying Christmas gifts and what I love even more is watching my kids open those gifts on Christmas morning.  However, it makes me sad to think not all kids get to experience that same feeling my kids do on Christmas. We're lucky in the fact that we have the means to buy at Christmas time, but I’m always torn, I want to give my kids what they want, but I also want to make sure they (myself included) don’t get so caught up in the material aspect of Christmas.

The last couple of years I went a little Christmas crazy when it came to buying gifts for Rowen.  Add to that all of the stuff she receives from friends and family each year and it’s almost overwhelming -the fact that our playroom is running out of room due to the amount of toys, says a lot!  So this year, especially now that we have two kids, I decided to take a step back to see how I could still give the kids a good Christmas without going overboard...

I’m not exactly sure where I came across this idea, but I love it!  In a nutshell, you get one gift per kid to fit each category.  I showed it to Ryan and he was instantly on board.  I love that it’s simple and keeps Christmas from being too excessive.  We plan to start this gift tradition each year with the hope that Rowen and Wyatt will learn to appreciate everything they receive and not be lost in a sea of presents!   I've seen some people go a step further with this idea and assign each gift category a certain spending amount.  We use the envelope system {that post is here} so we aren’t doing this, but it’s a good option if you want to stick to a budget!

That being said, my shopping is done and I can’t wait for Christmas to get here!