I have a file on my computer called The Big List. Compiled from years of calendars and To Do lists, it is what I want to remember, celebrate, and accomplish.

From cleaning routines, celebrity birthdays, and my obsession with listening to records from our vinyl collection and watching movies on the date they were released, The Big List is the things I want to do, observe, and spend my time on in any given week.

Each week I think out loud as I’m planning and invite you to eavesdrop.

Here is the week I hope to have:

12.04.22 – 12.10.22

• 4th – Colts Sunday Night Football
• 5th – Great Christmas Light Fight ABC
• 6th – St. Nicholas Day

First things first

Be gentle on yourselves. We’ve learned lessons over the last few years about what behaviors and circumstances are sustainable, about what is healthy. Let’s apply them to the holiday season.

• What is essential? Are there any shortcuts?
• What do I need help with? What can I delegate?

To Do / Enjoy / Remember:

• December schedules can get chaotic in a hurry if we aren’t careful. Make sure the December calendar is current.
• Mind your budget. Set holiday boundaries. Manage expectations. Be kind, but this might be the week to have some clear conversations ahead of the holiday season. No need to be a grinch, of course, but there’s also no need to be a holiday martyr or overtax yourself. That’s not what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown.
• Hang stockings
• Update addresses as holiday cards arrive
• Mail Christmas cards
• Plan menus for Christmas week
• Make a list of all the groceries you need for Christmas meals and begin purchasing freezer and non-perishable items
• Order any speciality meal or floral holiday items for Christmas week This year I’m skipping this, due to budget constraints, but if you’re preordering items make sure you’re mindful of deadlines and delivery dates.
• Wrap gifts
• Purchase Christmas themed napkins
• Eat from the freezer, use some of the stockpile of freezer meals
• Does everyone have a tub for their stocking stuff? We use simple, inexpensive white dishpans to contain stocking contents on Christmas morning. It makes corralling the tiny items and candies easier. Sometimes during the year our tubs get repurposed for other things, so I like to double check. My local big box store sells these for around $2 each in the section of the store with dish drainers and laundry baskets and storage.

• Under the tree emergency box: a small discreet box with extra bulbs, ornament hooks, and batteries
• Put the Christmas blankets on the beds and sofa, the Christmas plush, too
• Set out the Christmas puzzles, games, and coloring books
• Take November FO (finished object) photos
• Purchase some Christmas gifts My budget is telling me “you’re finished here”
• Update Roku screensaver – I use family photos
• It’s payday this week: Budget x Paycheck, stuff cash envelopes

I plan to put up my feet and knit along to …

• Holiday Baking Championship
• Christmas Cookie Challenge
• Gingerbread Showdown
• Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
• A Year Without a Santa Claus
• The Santa Clause
• How the Grinch Stole Christmas (1967)
• Christmas Vacation
• The Shop Around the Corner (1940)
• Mickey’s Once Upon a Christmas
• Mickey’s Twice Upon a Christmas
• Garfield’s Christmas Special

I have a few things I want to knit as Christmas gifts, so I’ve padded my To Watch list extra cushy this week so I can get in some quality couch and yarn time.

This is a good time of year to bookmark the Christmas TV Schedule site.

My main influences:

• Martha Stewart’s monthly calendars that were in her magazine (no longer in print). 
• Cynthia Ewer’s Organized Home, which she has retired. 
• Alison May’s Brocante Home.
• Frasier. Yes, the television show from the 1990s. Ridiculous, but true. From time to time I share images from my Frasier Book, a pandemic project I started in 2020.

Let’s be kinder than necessary this holiday season. (But with firm boundaries, okay babies? With firm boundaries.) Be brave. Be kind. Keep going.