The magic of Christmas has entered the Gibson household this year - Anna is beginning to understand what Christmas means! Well, actually I should re-phrase that to say Anna understands that Father Christmas comes and leaves presents under the tree if you are a good girl. She is now telling everyone who she happens to see dressed in any item of red clothing, that she would like a Dolls House (which is a bonus as her Mummy has already put a word in with the elves that Anna may have liked that. I know my daughter well!).
As for her mother, up until this past day or so, I have been going round looking and sounding like scrooge!!! On Tuesday, a group of friends with accompanying toddlers meet. (We pretend to go for their music class so they get 'educational stimuli' but really, it just an excuse for coffee, food and a gossip!!!). This Tuesday, my poor friends had to put up with me whinging every time that a new Christmas song came on and if I heard Noddy Holder yell 'It's Christmas' one more time, the Cd wasn't going to get to see another Christmas after I got hold of it! Annabel's Mum just started laughing at me in the end as I automatically grimaced as each new Christmas song was played. For goodness sake, it was only December 1st. I am sure that Christmas songs were not played until, at least, the 20th in my day (sounding as old as I feel!!!).
I just hate the commercial aspect of it all. This is why I refused to even think about anything Christmas at all until December 1st but it seems as though the whole world has already bought and gift-wrapped their presents while I am left wondering if I have enough time to do it all. To be fair, I had already planned Anna's gifts in October but that is different because it is my little girl so it doesn't matter what time of year it is - I still get excited about gifts for Anna.
To me, Christmas is all about time spent with family and showing people that you care about them by the giving of a gift, regardless of how expensive/inexpensive it is. I know that young children would find this a hard concept to understand and, for them, it is all about Father Christmas magically coming down the chimney on Christmas Eve and leaving them a present under the tree. I wouldn't want it any other way. However, I think adults may have lost sight of it too and everyone feels pressured into getting expensive gifts that they can't afford (especially this year) and it all becomes a little competitive, especially when it begins in September!
However, there are certain events that have occurred this week that have begin to melt my scrooge-like heart and I am actually beginning to get excited too (finally!!)
1. The first is Anna's pure excitement at seeing a Christmas tree in our local Sports centre (where we go dancing). She raced in and the smile on her face was incredibly wide. 'Look Mummy' she gasped as she looked at me with her eyes as wide as saucers. 'It is a Christmas tree. That means Father Christmas will come soon and leave presents' before she then started jumping up and down, just to try and release some of that pure adrenalin of excitement racing through her body! She then sat under the tree until her dance class began. I honestly think that she expected Father Christmas to come, then and there and drop off her present. I had to explain that he would come on Christmas Eve and, being the wonderful girl she is, said 'OK' but has then asked me if it is Christmas Eve every hour since that day!
2. Anna's advent calender has also got me a little excited! Due to Anna asking when it will be Christmas Eve (see point 1 above), I thought it may help to get an advent calender. At first, I did want to get one which didn't contain chocolate and just had a merry Christmas scene on the front of it. I failed in my quest. All non-chocolate calenders seemed to be highly religious images which seemed a little grown up for a 3 year old. I have later discovered that you can get fuzzy felt advent calenders which would have been rather cool but not to be for this year at least. Now, after dinner, Anna starts bouncing up and down on her chair saying 'Finished pudding, Father Christmas door time'. Anna's calender is then taken form the top shelf (all of the chocolate would be long gone if I put it within arms reach of Anna) and we discuss what day it is before she finds the corresponding number. Anna then counts the 'doors' left until Christmas Eve and gets very excited!
3. The third event to make me more excited about Christmas is the Christmas nativity! Last week, we had a letter from pre-school saying that there was to be a school play next Friday. I later found out that it is actually the nativity. Now, this deserves a post all of it's own, which I will write ASAP but, needless to say, it has got me very excited!
4. This weekend has also seen me think more Christmas-like thoughts. We are going to the Santa sleepover at Alton Towers!!! I'm not sure all that it entails but I do know that there will be real Reindeer, Santa's Grotto in a secret hiding place, complete with Santa inside, lots of fake snow and it all decorated like the North Pole within the actual park. It also involves a hotel, scrumptious Christmas dinner and magic shows, disco and puppet shows galore! We have told Anna but I was a little worried that she thought this would mean that it is actually Christmas this weekend, complete with Dolls house. I then had to explain that we needed to ask Father Christmas about the Dolls House before he actually came on Christmas Eve. This took some explaining!
5. I have realised that getting excited means that I can forget entirely about my birthday which was making me feel depressed beyond belief! (It is a big one and I will be feeling incredibly old by this time next week)
So, once I return form Santa's wonderland this weekend (Alton Towers is owned by the Madame Tussards group so I am anticipating that it should be a good makeover job of the park and will feel very 'Christmas-like'. Fingers crossed. I think the scrooge will have entirely left me and I will be one very excited mummy due to my very excited 3 year old!!! Yay!
No comments:
Post a Comment