Simplifying Christmas: Reduce Stress & Celebrate with Purpose with PAM FIELDS

Are you feeling the holiday pressure already?" That's what we'll be unpacking in our heart-to-heart conversation with Pam Fields, a mother who has mastered the art of simplifying Christmas traditions to make the season less hectic and more enjoyable. We're sharing her tried-and-tested strategies, including how they've pared down their baking list to a few family favorites, and their unique approach to adapting Christmas traditions. This conversation will leave you feeling inspired and equipped to navigate the holiday season, finding joy and meaning in the midst of the traditional chaos.

Our focus then shifts to a thought-provoking exploration of celebrating Christmas with purpose. Through our discussion with Pam, we delve into the true essence of gift-giving, transforming the often competitive atmosphere into an opportunity for heartfelt expression of love. We underline the importance of teaching children the true narrative of Christmas, fostering an understanding of the real gift of the season. This part of our conversation will inspire you to approach the holidays differently, bringing intentionality into your celebrations.

Finally, we round off our conversation with Pam with a series of practical tips for holiday planning and gift ideas, all aimed at reducing stress and enhancing joy during the holidays. We delve into understanding love languages, creating meaningful gifts on a budget, and fostering connections through a secret sibling name swap. You'll learn how to make your holidays not just manageable but truly memorable. Tune in and discover how to simplify your Christmas traditions, reduce stress, and find more joy in the holiday season. Together, let's reclaim the magic of Christmas!


Connect with Pamela Fields:
✔ Website: https://tendingfields.net/
✔ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tendingfields/
✔ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pam-fields-a387061a9/
✔ Podcast: https://anchor.fm/themomnextdoor
✔ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TendingFields

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

of, do we do Santa Claus and do the secular Christmas or do we do Jesus and do the Christian Christmas, right, as if there's a 100% separation between those two and they can't connect at all. And so we had that as young parents. We thought what should we do? And at that point I had read a book by a gal named Martha Zimmerman and I think it's out of print celebrating the Christian year, and she talked about St Nicholas Day and the origin of who St Nicholas was. And I thought I had no idea who St Nicholas was. I thought we had Santa Claus or we had Jesus and that was our choice, right. But it turns out that St Nicholas was actually a man who lived.

Speaker 2: 0:55

Hi, I'm Ruth Hubsup. Kim, welcome to the Out of the Darkness podcast, where we help you navigate life's trials based on faith and biblical truths. Today, my guest on Out of the Darkness is Pam Field. We are tackling the subject of Christmas and how, as parents, we are sometimes stressed and under pressure to meet what we think is the expectations of the world in our families. Join me as Pam and I talk about what we have done in the past for our families, what we do today and how you can implement some of the tips and tricks that Pam has to make the season a little bit less stressful and more enjoyable and essentially, find the reason for the season.

Speaker 2: 1:46

Welcome, pam, to Out of the Darkness. I'm so glad you're back and we are talking about Christmas and for some people, christmas can be a very chaotic and stressful time of year. But I know that you've got some considering. You have a large family and what it takes to organize all of that. You've got some great ideas on how we can remove some of that stress and enjoy what Christmas is all about. So welcome to Out of the Darkness.

Speaker 1: 2:19

Thanks so much and it is so much fun talking with you. I don't know that we want to tell people that we've already been talking for like half an hour without even getting a record, because we just have so much fun being together and so yay. I'm happy to be here.

Speaker 2: 2:36

I'm glad you are too, and this is. You know. As most of the audience knows, we pre-record our podcast, so we're not doing this in December or November, so we need to get into that preparation mode for Christmas as well. So I know what I do traditionally with my kids and it's a little bit different than what my parents did.

Speaker 2: 3:00

As children, we didn't celebrate Christmas the way North Americans typically do. Our Christmases were very low-key. Obviously, it was with family. You know, one side my dad's side would be whether it was Christmas day and then Christmas Eve would be with my mom's for a while, and then we did it on New Year's Eve. But we always had family, but it was very low-key. We didn't have baking. I mean, we cooked and, you know, prepared special desserts, but not the way we do it now, you know, with all of the traditional cooking and all the gifts and all the decorations. So it was different.

Speaker 2: 3:42

When my kids came around, I adopted some of the traditions of my in-laws and my mother-in-law and father-in-law used to start baking in November Not a lot, but a variety of stuff and cut them into little squares. Well, it was the first time for me, pam, and it was. I loved the idea and I adopted that, and now I can't get away from it. My girls do the same thing. They're following in that tradition, so that was one of the things that we started to do. What is one of the traditions that you started off with your family?

Speaker 1: 4:22

Well, I love doing traditions and when you said baking, that made me think about the way I do baking. We do have nine children, five of them are adults now, but when they were all coming on and I imagined, like all the baking, there's so many things, right, there's so many things for Christmas that you could do to be part of your traditions. If you do it all, you're going to go crazy. But baking in particular, I told each one of my kids, you get to pick one thing and that is what we're going to do. And so when I started, like earlier in December well, this is terrible my younger children never had a lot of choice. They were on my melting team.

Speaker 1: 5:07

So if I could go get those, like you know, those little round melting wafers, like vanilla wafers, my little guys, your job is to melt those in the microwave, stir them up and we throw in some crushed candy canes, spread it in a cookie sheet. That's your cookie. And so we do that. And then I let them the little boys especially they just pound and pound and break that into pieces and then we could freeze it and they're one off the list, you know. And then there was another one who really liked to make this like peanut butter chocolate thing. Again, it was a little bit of mixing like graham crackers and peanut butter and sugar together, but there was a lot of melting involved and that's just easier for the younger ones and those things seem to freeze well. So I would just kind of tick it off the list the easier, real freezable things, and I would maybe only make one thing, two things a week and then by the time we got to Christmas we had all the treats, but it was too overwhelming to do it all at once.

Speaker 2: 6:10

So it's true. It is true. I mean, I don't know why. I think it's just the way I am. When the kids were young, I did all of the baking, so I'd make a variety of maybe 13 different things and then other whatever. I'd go overboard. It was just, it was my nature to do that. But as the kids got older, I did the same thing. We kind of narrowed it down to the ones that they really really liked.

Speaker 2: 6:38

And if I don't do this one particular roll, which is the easiest thing to make, I think they'll kick me out of the house. That's how it is. They really want this one particular chocolate roll that I make and they love it. It has peanut butter in it. Anyway, I digress, but this is what they, this is what it was.

Speaker 2: 7:01

But I found that the older they got, the more we simplified things. When they were little, I think I was just trying to make up for things during the year that we may not have been able to do. But as they've gotten older, as they got older, I realized I wanted them to focus more on what Christmas was truly about and taking the time to do that. And when we're trying and this was true for myself when I was trying to do it all decorate the home, do all the baking, get the gifts, wrap the gifts, give them, you know, seasonal entertainment, whatever it was we really let what Christmas was about fall between the cracks. Yeah, yeah, it's just over, just too much. Why are we doing all this really? And, yeah, I needed to think about that one.

Speaker 1: 8:04

When I felt like I was on this hamster wheel because I had to go, do all the things, sign up for all the things and and make all the memories, because there's people with a lot of amazing ideas. We're in this era of Pinterest and, well, you know all Instagram. Everybody's got these great inspirations and so we think that is so great. That's what I need to do, and we just keep adding and adding, and adding, and then we're so exhausted that we're angry, right?

Speaker 1: 8:33

Yes so exhausted 100% that we can't even absorb it and it's it makes it not enjoyable. And so I agree, we've had to pare down and and guess what Traditions are traditions?

Speaker 1: 8:47

because you do them every year, you know, for the most part right, so adding something new every year maybe wouldn't be as traditional, whereas you know, pick the four or five things you do say these are the things we're going to do every single year, and then you know if we get a chance to do that this year, that's fine. If if we don't, that's okay. Going to see lights was one of ours. It was not one of the we must do every year, but when we could and it fit the schedule and there was a neighborhood that was all lit up and we could spend an hour or two driving through or walking through the light parade or the light thing, then that was great.

Speaker 1: 9:33

But I did not commit to do it every single year because if it, if it was a scheduled thing and it doesn't work out on the schedule, then everybody's going to be a little disappointed, but yeah we have to limit, we have to, and you're right about picking and choosing what is really meaningful to the family.

Speaker 2: 9:51

I've come to understand, like my oldest is 32 almost and will be 32 for Christmas, but they love putting up the Christmas tree, not because it's a fancy Christmas tree or I have Christmas baubles that are really fancy, it's because every ornament has a story behind it and I remember a few years ago they were putting up the tree and my son was telling his then fiance, now his bride or wife, what each one was, where it came from, who gave it, where we went?

Speaker 2: 10:25

because we have a lot of ornaments we pick up when we travel. It doesn't matter if they're traveling or I'm traveling, we pick up ornaments and, interestingly enough, I've just found out that my kids do this now for themselves. They are picking up baubles to put onto their Christmas tree. So this was something that didn't cost anybody anything. It actually decompressed everyone because we sat around and laughed until tears were rolling down our faces putting up a tree, and you know it's it's. It's entertaining to watch grown your grown children putting Christmas trees up and arguing about whose ornament childhood ornament is going to be front and center on the tree. Of course, my son's is always at the top. He's the tallest, so it's just fun. But you're right, we need to pick and choose on.

Speaker 1: 11:19

Yeah, that's beautiful. Your Christmas tree is like your, your family album in a way. Yes and a walk down memory lane to and what a great way to bring in a new daughter-in-law to like. Let me just share with you the stories right, exactly that's what we're supposed to have times of remembrance. What an opportunity for a time of remembrance. That's really amazing. It is.

Speaker 2: 11:43

How about gifts? How do you, how did you manage doing gifts for nine kids? I mean, I had three kids as a single mom and we had very, very difficult years in the early years where I I literally went to the dollar store and picked up gifts for my kids because that's all I could afford that year, and we had a paper Christmas where I could not afford it, and that was the first year after my divorce and they made gifts for each other with paper. I went to the dollar store, but that's what they did and they were very young. My youngest was at the time maybe two years old, so, but those are memories that we have that they still talk about 25 plus years later. How did you manage to keep sanity in this crazy commercial time with gifts?

Speaker 1: 12:40

Well, I think that it takes a little while to to kind of get our bearing and have our confidence that what we're doing is enough, because early on I of course, when we only had one or two I would go out oh, I'm going to buy this one and this one, and I'm going to buy this and this is. And then we've got like a ridiculous amount of gifts. When we started having a few more kiddos and I still thought it had to be big, they had to have lots and lots to unwrap. So I was going to the Dollar Tree and getting all all these things just so that there would be a quantity of things. But then at one point I realized the ridiculousness of managing it and the tedium of like Making sure. The numbers were like does this person have seven, does this person have nine? Oh no, I better run over and buy a couple more things so they each have exactly the same right. And it kind of created an anxiety right.

Speaker 1: 13:38

And I had heard there's different models of this out there and I'm sure if you go on Pinterest or wherever, you will find it. Some people say they bring the number of gifts the wise men brought right. So there was gold, frankincense and Mer, and so they're gonna give their children three gifts Symbolizing that gold, frankincense and Mer. We did four gifts and we, let's see, we said we're gonna do one thing. That is something to do. One thing was now, this is a little outdated. We said a CD or a.

Speaker 2: 14:15

Work day or something like that.

Speaker 1: 14:17

Right so, but the idea was something to do with your hands, something to listen to, and Then we would do a book and a piece of clothing. We've smushed that together and the book and the audio thing became one, and we did Added on like, oh, what was it? We added on, I Can't remember what it was, but but anyway. So we've kind of morphed it through the years, so so we've ratcheted it down and it's it's become a little more purposeful so that we can have intention when we give gifts. And I found that when I was just grabbing stuff, just for the sake of grabbing it, I had little thought or intention.

Speaker 1: 15:07

And One of the things that we do now is we want to every gift that we give, we do limit it to like three or four. We decide on the year we do in three, this year or four, and Will these things that we're going to give our child lead them and point them to Jesus, or Would it be something that could perhaps create a stumbling block? And so that's one of the Like parameters or overarching thoughts when we do go put, go do our shopping and our planning and, of course, with the internet now and being able to shop different ways. That's expanded and we can really think about it at home. We can discuss that we're not going to the store. In fact, very rarely Do we just go to the store and go shopping Christmas shopping and buy things. We do all of our planning at home and then Can vary with purpose, go out and get it done.

Speaker 2: 16:04

I think we need to be purposeful about. And I remember years ago when the kids were really young. So I was divorced when my youngest was Five, well, separated when she was five months old. So you know, as the kids were getting older, there were two different ways of celebrating Christmas one at mom's home and one at dad's home. And you know it, even if it's not intentional, people sometimes do not consider what the other person, persons financial situation wouldn't be. And I don't say that they did it intentionally, I I don't. I don't think they ever did. It was just what they thought was the right thing to do. So the kids would go to their dad's side of the family and they loved it. Of course they did. You know it was. It was away from the, the discipline, the routine. I understand that. I was a kid too, you know. So I was glad the children had that. I honestly I did people think I'm crazy when I say it but I was glad my children had their dad and their family to have a different type of Christmas over there.

Speaker 2: 17:16

But I sometimes Was guilt-ridden because they would come home with gifts that I could not afford as a single mom. Yeah, and I didn't know how to deal with it. It it broke me in in some during some holidays and I had to remind myself we are not competing. I had to remind myself what this was about and why we were doing it. So one year I came up with this crazy idea and I I don't know what my kids thought about it at that point, but just before Christmas they had to fill up each one of them a small little box, or had to take out a certain number of toys or Books or whatever it was that were in good condition Good condition, something that they would want to receive, and we would pay, give that forward to someone else Like donates that, so that they the house, did not become this ma'am of Things. So it was interesting to watch how a young child's mind worked when I said to them it has to be in a condition that you would like to get it and and when they would show me something, I'd say how would you feel about this? And this was a tradition I used for a long time. We did that for a while and I Just wanted them to understand that it wasn't about just receiving but giving in the way that they could give at the time. So that was one of the traditions that we had also started.

Speaker 2: 19:02

Now I have to admit something to you, pam and this is not with pride but with shame that I say it that when my kids were young, I was not Not really walking with the Lord, not really I wasn't walking with the Lord. Therefore, I Wish at the time I had implemented Reading the Christmas story, talking to my children, I mean, I did at a high level, obviously. They went to Sunday school. We talked about the birth of Christ, but Not the way that I feel that I should have been doing it, not the way that I envisioned doing it with my grandchildren one day. Yeah, so what can parents do? Because I wish I had done this, pam, honestly. What can parents do today to bring their children to what the word of God Says about Christmas? What is Christmas really about? What is this gift that God has given us?

Speaker 2: 20:12

What is some of the tips or what advice do you have about that?

Speaker 1: 20:17

Well, I would start off by saying can we just get this out of the way? There is a lot of do we do Santa Claus and do the secular Christmas, or do we do Jesus and do the Christian Christmas? Right, as if there's a 100% separation but between those two and they can't connect at all. And so we had that as young parents, we, we thought what should we do? And At that point I had read a book by a gal named Martha Zimmerman and I think it's out of print celebrating the Christian year, and she talked about St Nicholas Day and the origin of who St Nicholas was, and I thought I had no idea who St Nicholas was. I thought we had Santa Claus or we had Jesus and that was our choice, right.

Speaker 1: 21:10

But it turns out that St Nicholas was actually a man who lived, and way, way long ago, in a place far, far away, and Nicholas loved the Lord Jesus so much that he wanted to bestow gifts on people in need, just like you were doing with your kids. He wanted to provide food. He wanted to provide okay. So, just as a quick snapshot, this is where we get the whole stocking thing that St Nicholas knew. These young ladies in this time had to have a dowry to be able to get married, and this family had no money for a dowry, and so Nicholas snuck outside their window when this girl was coming of age and tossed coins into her window. They fell into some say her stockings, which were drying in the windowsill, some say the shoes that were sitting underneath the windowsill. And then he ended up doing this for each of the daughters and the family, which provided for them a way to get married, which was a really big deal in that time. The consequence, or the opposite, if they did not get married, would not be a great future for them. So I heard about that story of St Nicholas and I thought, oh, my goodness, this is so cool, I wanna do that. And so I started doing St Nicholas stockings for our children, and his birthday is, I always forget St Nicholas.

Speaker 1: 22:42

It's like December 6th, december 7th. So as we roll into Christmas, the first about week of December, we actually talk about St Nicholas. We don't go Santa Claus crazy, we talk about St Nicholas, we talk about the life of St Nicholas, we read stories about St Nicholas and I even have some of the like old world figurines of what he would have looked like the actual one, and so we do that, and then, on what we call St Nicholas Day, we read the stories again and then we open our stockings and that is something. So we're not missing out on that fun and wonder. But when St Nicholas Day is over, we don't do Santa Claus, st Nicholas, we put those ornaments away, we put the all that away and we're solely focusing on the manger and on Christ. But we don't forget that St Nicholas loved Jesus and that is why he lived as he did.

Speaker 1: 23:53

And so it's a really great opportunity for parents to cultivate, like in our children, an attitude and a heart for giving and a heart for the Lord and recognizing that it's not separate Our faith is not separate than our lives and our actions. So you may have to redirect me. What was the second? Was there a second part?

Speaker 2: 24:14

No, that was it. It's interesting about the stockings, though my kids to this day they cannot do without the stockings. I prepare them stockings for each one and it's fun to see it. But I loved what you said about that. It's adapting our faith to really shine, taking that and letting that our faith shine through this season. And I, too, actually never really promoted Santa Claus and I never said there wasn't or I never talked about it.

Speaker 1: 24:54

Well, there was yeah, there was yes historically.

Speaker 2: 24:58

If when you go back, there was, but I never, ever said Santa Claus is gonna bring you a gift, or this is from Santa Claus, or if you're not good, I don't like. I never did that. It was the same thing with. Well, easter is a whole other story.

Speaker 1: 25:13

I don't celebrate.

Speaker 2: 25:14

Easter in the worldly way. I've never done that. But Christmas, that's how I kind of did it. I never said it. If the kids thought it was from Santa Claus, it was from Santa Claus when they were very young.

Speaker 2: 25:28

Again, as I said, I wasn't walking in faith, so I had a gift under the tree that said from Santa. There was one gift and it was the cheapest gift of the lot. Right, because I wasn't. I had enough people to compete with. I wasn't gonna compete with Santa Claus as well, so Santa Claus was the cheapest gift.

Speaker 2: 25:47

But I'll just say, right, I mean, I wanted my kids to have fun, but I also wanted them to understand what Christmas was about and do that. And that's what I want people to understand is that I'm not a humbug. I love Christmas. I love certain aspects of it. I love the fact that I can get everyone under the same roof and celebrate and have a wonderful time and our traditions and the laughter. To me when I think about Christmas. It's laughter because my kids are hilarious, drive me nuts even as adults, but there's always laughter in my home. We're always laughing because that's who we are and that's what Christmas.

Speaker 2: 26:32

When someone asks me about, you know how I think of Christmas. Yes, now, as a believer, christmas is one of my favorite holidays, because the birth of Christ is the gift that, oh goodness, I want to shout on the rooftops and we talked about this a little bit before, but I'm just so excited to tell people about Christ and the redemption we have through it and the grace that he gives us that I want to shout about it. So Christmas has become now to me, this awesome gift we should talk about, and on the other side, it celebrates my family being together. So for me, it's come around in this circle to where. This is how I define Christmas for my family.

Speaker 2: 27:19

But I also want others to get rid of the guilt, right, because we also live in this guilt, and you touched on that when you said we have Pinterest, we have Instagram, we have social media worthy images. We don't know what's happening in the back. But I really want parents, especially women, who are running like chickens without a head over this holiday season and they're frazzled, right yeah, and they're stressed and they forget about enjoying the holiday. They don't even know if they're coming or going at that point.

Speaker 1: 27:58

And we just want it to be over. We're like I don't care about the holiday anymore, I'm done.

Speaker 2: 28:04

Yes, I mean that kind of defeats, all of that stress. You put yourself under right. So I really want people to focus in on what Christmas is and enjoy what they can do and alleviate some of that stress that they might have. Yeah, yeah, Because it's there. It's there like it or not, right? I think as moms, we tend to do that. We want things to be perfect for our children. But if we ask our children now, you and I have older kids so we can ask them, and I have asked my children and my children are very honest. They would never sugarcoat anything to prevent me from getting hurt, but I have asked them do you remember the years where you know things were really tight and they don't? What thing we talk about and I've observed this now with friends and family is really those times where we were all together and we celebrated whether I had my bonus children in the house, because I'm blessed with that as well. I have, you know, several bonus children. If they're in town.

Speaker 2: 29:19

They're with us. To me, that's what it is, you know, celebrating. I know that you mentioned something about a preference guide, survey guide that our listeners can maybe get from you. Can you talk about that a little bit?

Speaker 1: 29:39

Yeah, I think again feeling like if you just jump into Christmas and you're running around like you have to do all the things and you just you get scattered and you can't figure it out, probably because I have a big family, one year I thought there is absolutely no way I can keep this straight. I need to make a little form for myself, and so I just created handwritten and then photocopied it. You know your had, and then I handed one out to each of my children. Put your name on it and tell me what's your favorite color, what's your favorite candy bar. You know, if you could have any snack, what would it be If you could have a gift card from somewhere? Where would it be? I've added on that just for my own benefit. What size shoes do you wear? You know what?

Speaker 2: 30:32

size pants do you wear?

Speaker 1: 30:34

Yeah, yeah, and if there's a book you want to read and one on your list, what would it be? Or is there a certain type of music you like? And I mean really, it could be made however you want it to be. And when I made it in the early years, it was more preschool, elementary school, you know, focused, and that was really helpful to me, because I didn't wander around aimlessly throwing things in the cart and I didn't have to wonder did they like nerds, ropes or starburst, or did they like chocolate, you know? And so I was able to, with that intentionality, make my plans and get the things done. It made shopping so much easier.

Speaker 1: 31:23

And the other thing is I these are like an amazing memory memento, right. So I have these back, for I'm wondering if it's been 20 years. You have to put a book together. Oh, wouldn't that be fun, like a family book. Yes, all of those. Because when you look when my little ones, before they, could write themselves, I would be their writer and they'd tell me what they wanted and I'd write it on the blank. You know those precious little requests, and then, as they grew up, they would write it on their own. So that's then in their handwriting and so all of these from every year I have to go back to, and that is a memory and that's super fun. Like you said, it costs nothing, right, Just a few photocopies. And so now I have kind of changed it through the years, grown it up a little bit, but my I mean my youngest is 10 and he still fills out the same form that my older ones do. Even I have some married ones now and they're all still filling out the same form.

Speaker 1: 32:29

But I've added a few things to the bottom of it, and one of them is what's your love language? Because that could affect the kind of gift I give, right, if they their love language is the gift of time, I might give them tickets to a movie theater instead of a physical item. Right, I might try to think about, even if they're their, their love languages, words of encouragement. I might give them a gift, yes, but spend some time creating something where I speak life into them and they're still getting something. But I'm focusing on that right area. Another thing that I have on that list is what's the Lord been teaching you this year and is there something you know, like a scripture, that you've really been encouraged by this year and then at the end, how can I pray for you this year? And that's been really eye-opening too, like I realized.

Speaker 1: 33:32

When I get these back now, I send them out to all my kids, I email them. Sometimes they request now can you give me an auto-fill PDF? I really don't wanna write it out. So that does change through the years too, but when I get them back I'm like you know, there's things that I might have missed or I didn't even realize that, especially now that I've got kids living in different states right. So those have been very helpful and I can't remember if I mentioned or not. I photocopy these and send them to the grandma's, because then the grandma's know if they shop, how to shop and they're not wasting their money on things that they say I want to give something that I know my grandchild wants to get, but I just don't see them all the time and I don't really know. And they are equally amused with all of the answers and watching our children and our grandchildren develop. So that's really really great.

Speaker 1: 34:33

We also, because we have so many, we do a secret sibling name swap and so we draw names. Early October I send out the survey and then people start filling it out and I will make sure that whoever got who for secret sibling also receives their survey with their preferences. And how can you pray for me this year? And it just gives opportunities for our children to connect into their adulthood, and I'm anyway. So that's. I use that. I've been using it for years and I have created a PDF. Actually, I didn't, one of my elves did, and I will make that available. And if somebody goes to my website, I think they can click to join the mailing list and then you'll get a copy of that. So that's, I do that. I keep it in a little notebook and that really helps me when I go places to have my notebook with all my planning in it.

Speaker 2: 35:37

I think that's a wonderful idea, but really consider putting that into a book because I think that your children will appreciate. Going back over the years, we started something well similar. One of my I think it was Alexis who founded on a line.

Speaker 2: 35:57

It's called Name Draw, or yeah, I think it's called name draw dot com or something, and you put in the names of everybody and you go, everybody goes on to the website and there's all the names and you. It pairs you with someone, so it's like your secret partner. So we don't know who the other person has. So we don't have any young kids in the family yet.

Speaker 2: 36:24

I don't have grandchildren, but my kids love gifting and they go. I say overboard. They say it is not overboard, but it's a holiday. It's a holiday. So when they buy a gift for each other, they sometimes take it apart and wrap each one. So they'll be. Maybe in my house there may be a hundred gifts because they'll go. You know, like these little, like a chocolate bar, they'll wrap the chocolate bar. My kids love this. They're adults but they love it. I can't take this away from them. So this draw name draw, like yours, allows all of them to put what they would like. And we've put a limit for each person because there's, you know, everybody's on a budget, everybody is starting off and everybody's buying homes. So we'll say the one person that you're buying for specifically, you drew a name, for it's an X amount of dollars you spend on that person. And because everybody wants to give a gift to everyone else, we said here's the amount that you spend on everyone else. There is a cap on that as well.

Speaker 2: 37:38

Now do they listen to that? I don't know, but after that it's up to them. Mom's done her duty. I'll just say that this really helped everyone focus in. So we start like in August, September as well, and it'll. I shop all year around, so it makes my life a lot easier to do this, but I think we need to do these things right. So I recommend that everybody go to your website and, you know, get this download. I'll put it in the show notes as well. And, Pam, I really appreciate it that you are here. Is there something, a final tip, idea, something, word of advice that you have for us?

Speaker 1: 38:21

Ooh, I think what we said earlier is just pairing down and spending some time to decide what's important. And yeah, we could get bogged down with the details. But yeah, a little planning ahead, a little intentionality, I think you will have a much more restful holiday.

Speaker 2: 38:41

Yeah, and remembering what the reason for the season is it is the birth of Christ?

Speaker 1: 38:46

Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 2: 38:48

Well, pam, I really appreciate you coming back. I had I always enjoyed my conversations with you. We can we can talk for a long time, so I really appreciate it. I'm glad you are here. I wish you a very happy holiday and a Merry Christmas as well to you and to your family. And you too. Let's continue on our journey as followers of Jesus Christ. I am Ruth Huffseppian.