Make the list..check it twice
The end of October signals that there is less than two months until Christmas. While many stores are restocking to start holiday sales, shopping is not what I am concerned with. Holiday planning comes first, and can encompass many things. So today I will focus on gift giving and share with you the lists our family uses to begin the holiday season.
There are many ways to make lists. I like to design simple printables using an excel spreadsheet. These I keep in a binder to refer back to each year. You can also write in a dedicated notebook, similar to a bullet journal style. Or take advantage of the holiday printables that many bloggers offer this time of year. Hint: use pinterest to find free downloadable holiday planning pages.
Before we start shopping , we need to list out who we are getting gifts for.
If you have a big family, as we do, this can be inundating. Therefore, I make separate lists to keep things more organized.
List #1: This list is just our kids and grandkids. My husband and I work on this together and keep the list in a secret place. Although we think we know our kids pretty well, we still share ideas back and forth about the best gifts. As the practical parent, it is my job to get something that each child can use. Dad is the fun parent and it’s his job is to shop the interweb to find and order the cool gifts. I print out a spreadsheet for him to keep track of online gifts.
List #2: We have a simple checklist for on my side of the family. As this includes nieces and nephews I rely on my kids to tell me what is fashionable and trendy. In recent years my daughters have done the most decision making. I just supply the funds, wrap the gifts, and, of course, keep the checklist handy.
List #3: On my husband’s side of the family, the gifting tradition is based on name drawing. My sister-in-law uses a hat that has slips of paper with each person’s name. Each year, shortly after our gifts are opened, she passes the hat around so we can know for next year who we have. Name drawing is a great holiday tradition that makes sure everyone gets a gift without anyone having to spend too much. This list is stuck on the refrigerator for ready reference.
List #4: The next list also pertains to my husband’s side of the family. It is the Godparent / Godchild list. Godparents and Godchildren traditionally share gifts at Christmas and birthdays. Thankfully, we compiled this list years ago and there hasn’t been much change. This list also gets posted on the refrigerator for easy reference.
I hope this brief summary of our list making gives you inspiration to get this phase of holiday planning started. You will probably notice that I didn’t add any gifts to that gift list. In my next post I will tell you how we sort out the kinds of gifts we need.
Happy Crafting, Geri