Time and Money Talks

Photo Credit: Shelley Fourney

Time and Money Reality Check

The Time Piece

You don’t have the bandwidth for everything and that’s ok. I don’t know about you, but it is difficult to sort out where my/our time and money will be spent during the holidays and I don’t want to get to January exhausted and broke. I have found that I enjoy this season so much more if I am realistic about my time and do some things ahead of time. That means I have to be realistic about what I can do. I have been itching to do a bathroom remodel and GUESS WHAT I wanted it done before Christmas. I literally can feel the unease in my gut. Doing that is the difference between a chaotic, stressful season AND a calm one. I am learning to trust myself and instead of pushing myself to “GET ER DONE”. I am kindly recognizing that the margin during this time is hard enough, let alone with a project that tears my house up. That means the bathroom project has to wait until later so I stay calm, which really means sane and that ALWAYS impacts my home. 

I have learned that my personality needs to break all the things into small pieces so I don’t feel overwhelmed with the prep. To eliminate this I will start to work on these small pieces in the next couple weeks. For me the first step is deciding what is important to our family. We did this years back when we decided what matters to us from food to decorations to outside events. Honestly this has decreased as we became empty nesters. I have a Christmas Journal where I track various things I want to remember, food we enjoy, gifts, and timing. This is really a way to track what is important to our family. I will look through the list of tasks and begin to pencil them in on my calendar. I tend to make some food ahead of time that freezes well. I have a mashed potato recipe and sweet potato recipe that are delicious, and not only do I typically make them early in November, I make a double batch so I have one for both Thanksgiving and Christmas. Cookie dough is also made and placed in ziploc bags and frozen. It keeps for months.

During the holidays there are so many options - decorating, shopping, gift exchanges, work parties, church activities, traditions. I wonder what fills your soul? Will you look back on the holidays with disappointment if certain things don’t happen? Again, if you don’t know what is important to your people, ASK. “How do YOU/WE want to spend our time this holiday season?”

Stop letting the holidays happen TO you! 

Before you fill your calendar with every event and obligation, stop and ask yourself:

What traditions actually matter to you?

Which activities drain you?

What do you wish you had time for?

What is something you need to let go of?

Do you need some evenings or weekends with NO plans?

What would help your soul stay joyful during this season?

Does anyone else deal with guilt related to the holidays? Please tell me I am not the only one.

Sometimes we are only doing something because we feel guilty and obligated not because we want to. Two quotes that really help me when I am feeling this way are:

Choose guilt over resentment - Dave Ramsey

Guilt is an emotion. The presence of guilty feelings doesn’t always mean you have done something wrong. It might mean you have done something brave.    Dr. Alison Cooke

The Money Piece

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the money piece. It is so easy to spend and ask questions later. I have found that deciding on an amount we are spending on each person including each other (my spouse) really helps lower my stress about the holidays. This way my husband and I start out on the same page. We do decide who we will buy for and how much we will spend. We had some rough years financially and we had to limit who we bought gifts for. We decided to only buy for our kids, at times we didn’t buy for each other. Decisions that were excruciating at the time and I am glad we chose that rather than have a big credit card payment in January. These are hard choices and figuring out what works for your family is critical. This is what has worked for us, AND that doesn’t make it the gospel, just some things to consider as you sort through what might work for your family. 

What if you were to consider the following questions:

Will you have a budget?

What are you spending money on?

New decorations, Gifts, Prime Rib, or Bare Minimum  

Who are you buying for?

How much will you spend on each person?

I would love to hear what you come up with or already do. If you decide to share, please be sure and let me know if it is ok to share your ideas (by name or anonymously), we can all use ideas for how to make the holidays more peaceful.

So what is one thing you could begin to think about this week? Maybe it’s sitting down to talk budget. Maybe it’s looking at your calendar and blocking some evenings with NO plans. Maybe it’s asking your people what actually matters to them. Just pick one.

Next week we’re talking about protecting YOUR peace through this time as well as some scripts to help you communicate in a way that you feel good about.

And of course, I am here and happy to help if that is useful. Thank you for trusting me, and remember that just thinking about the time and money piece is progress.

What questions came up for you while reading this?

I'd love to hear what resonated or what you're curious about. Because remember - I'm not the expert on your life. I'm just here to help you figure out what works for YOU one baby step at a time.   970-729-3545

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Photo credit: Punky @punkturesphotography