day thirty: christmas list

I saw this idea on She Likes Purple a couple of weeks ago, and I thought it was just so much fun. A Christmas plan! A way to stay organized throughout the crazy month of December! Oh, man, lists make me so happy. So, without further ado, here are all the things I want to do in December to get ready for Christmas.

1. Decorate the house, including at least two homemade decorations. The homemade decorations will be easy ones; I’m thinking I’ll make some yarn trees, and use wrapping paper, 3D letters, and shadow frames to spell out a few Christmas words, like “Merry” or “Noel.”

2. Make a wreath for the front door. I already know the one I’m making; I saw the idea on Pinterest, but I can’t link to it right now. It involves one of those big wooden letters for the first letter of our last name, wrapped in garland, and attached to the door with a red bow. I think it’ll be simple and classy.

3. Go to our town’s Christmas tree-lighting event. It’s actually this weekend, and I’m hoping it’ll be better than it was last year.

4. Drive around to look at Christmas lights. There’s one particular neighborhood not far from where we live that sits right on a lake, and the houses are always so beautifully decorated and the lights look so pretty reflected in the water. We used to go every year before the boys were born, and I think they’ll be old enough to appreciate it this year.

5. Go to Wildlights at the zoo. We missed last year because Will was sick, so I’m really excited to go this year.

6. Make ornaments with the boys -- you know, the cinnamon ones. Andrew, in particular, will love doing this with me.

7. Finalize the plan for my Christmas cookie trays -- and make all the goodies. Last year I had my list entirely planned out by March, or something crazy like that. This year? Not so much.

8. Make gifts for the boys’ daycare teachers. I haven’t decided exactly what I’m doing for them yet. I may give them cookies, like last year, but I’ve been coveting these crayon monograms for years now. If I can find the time, I’d really like to make those for them.

9. Make gifts for Andrew’s classmates. This year, they’re getting “reindeer noses” -- eight Whoppers and one red gummy candy together in a decorative bag. (Yet another clever and adorable idea I found on Pinterest.)

10. Make gifts for the grandparents. I’m not quite sure what they will be yet, but I’m absolutely positive they will involve handprints and/or footprints.

11. Visit Santa. This will happen this coming weekend, as we have the tree-lighting event on Saturday evening, and Breakfast with Santa at church that morning.

12. Mail Christmas cards. Thanks to an awesome giveaway on Allison’s blog, I got 25 free cards from Shutterfly! I finally decided what card I want this morning; now I just need to build it. (And I would love to send each and every one of you a card, so if I don’t already have your address, please send it to me at cassiecraves@yahoo.com. Pretty please!)

13. Make some sort of Advent calendar. As much as I like the idea of the boys opening little boxes containing treats, I like the idea of doing activities even more (like the ones listed here). Since I have nothing prepared for this yet, I think I’ll probably just do the twelve days before Christmas so as not to overwhelm the guys, who are still pretty little and easily over-stimulated.

14. Go to the library twice a week to stock up on new Christmas books. Andrew and I went last night and picked out our first batch.

15. Have a family Christmas movie night, complete with hot chocolate.

It’s going to be a busy, and hopefully wonderful, month.