Last Weekend Brought Out My Holiday Spirit

We all know that the holidays are coming up! I hope you guys have a wonderful time and are able to spend it with your family. I spent this last weekend preparing for Christmas with my boyfriend.

**A Little Bit of a Back Story About Christmas **

I love Christmas and it has always been a great time of the year for me. Thankfully I have never had to worry about whether or not I was receiving a present on Christmas morning. I have always been provided for at Christmas time by my family. I know that not everyone can say the same.

Once I grew into an adult and moved away from home- I struggled financially like most young people. I got myself into debt and I didn’t always have the money for extras. That also meant that I couldn’t afford to give large gifts at Christmas time. But I could always expect my mother to go all out at Christmas even though I moved away from home- even though I never asked her to. She tells me it is because she knows that we do not have a lot of family and she wants to make sure that I receive something on Christmas Day.

On the other hand, my mother has never gotten the large Christmases that she made me so accustomed to. She grew up with 5 siblings in a poor family and felt lucky to receive even one present. Her mother would sometimes choose alcohol over feeding her own family. Despite that, my mom still loves her dearly (although her mother has passed away).

Hearing about her experiences with Christmas got me thinking. I tried to go all out with Christmas these last two years because I have been in a better place financially and in life. My mother is the type of person that says, “You don’t have to get me anything”. She knows that everyone has bills to pay so she never ‘expects’ a present. But I finally got the chance to spoil her last year.

My 21 year old nephew lives with her nowadays. I stayed the night with them on Christmas Eve last year, to be able to open presents early. I was more excited to open presents than my mom at first because she didn’t know what was coming. It was torture waiting for Christmas! At least for me!

My mother is an early bird because she normally works around 5am. My nephew and I are NOT. Despite that, I was up and we woke him up super early to open presents together because neither me nor my mom could wait.

We took turns opening a present each. My nephew wanted to drink coffee and wake up first. He was being slow about opening his presents. Once we got started- mom was NOT having it. It was so funny to see her rush HIM to open his presents so that she could get to hers. She had never done that before and it made me happy. We normally don’t have kids around at Christmas time but it felt like we did that year! We had a blast and I hope that this year is the same!

My Weekend was Spent Well Doing Christmas Prep

I am all set and ready to go for this year. I spent months looking for and collecting presents over time. Last weekend- I took the time and got the presents all wrapped and ready to go for Christmas. My boyfriend and I wrapped our presents together. It was super cramped because we only have a one bedroom apartment with TWO cats! We used our bed as our wrapping table to keep away from the kitties. Our little angels – cough – brats -cough- would have never let us wrap in peace Lol! He wrapped presents on the left side of the bed while I was across from him on the right side. It was claustrophobic for sure, but we did have fun.

The presents are ready and my mother gets one early. I got her an advent calendar so that she can have something to look forward to every day until Christmas. The X Days of Socks Advent Calendars go over great in my family! I super recommend them as a gift idea to you guys. Last year I got her a Mandalorian advent calendar. She doesn’t watch Star Wars but she thinks that ‘baby yoda’ is adorable. This year she is getting a Lilo and Stitch Calendar.

Don’t get me wrong- she’s not the only person that I’m excited to see open presents this year. I can’t wait to see my nephew’s face when he sees his Christmas card. But for a **different **reason! Last year, he gave me a gift card wrapped in a whole roll of duct tape. I spent AGES peeling off the tape but my family learned that I was a duct tape peeling champ. Apparently I did it much faster than he expected. This year- it is time for me to have a little fun!

Let me know what you guys plan to do for Christmas! Do you have any big surprises in store for someone?