Making Merry

I am working on updating my outlook to include all the exciting adventures that will occupy my time this December. I have discovered I have very few weeks without a party, no weekends without back to back events. I am a party animal, I tell you.

I have also discovered that my friends are all party animals. I have friends hosting parties at their homes, attending parties at others, swapping recipes for parties, finding funny gifts, serious gifts, white elephant gifts to exchange at parties. We are all sad we can't actually see each other unless we both are attending the same parties, but party season is party season.

Then if that wasn't enough fun, there is the additional church activities. Those are the ones where we do Christmas plays, choir cantatas, concerts, worship events, holiday field trips, special fundraising for Christmas missions. There are youth programs, children's programs, special dinners. We are partying at the church day in and day out.

When I am not partying, I am expected to continue to work, projects have not stopped, bills still need paid, meetings need to happen, planning has to occur. I am supposed to keep doing laundry, make dinner (aka as warming up, driving thru, calling in), decorate and clean my house, play with my son. This is hard to do and work in all the parties.

So I have decided it would be much better if I just stopped all of my other responsibilities and partied this month. Next month I will resume responsibilities. I think this is a reasonable solution to the scheduling problems and think it's only fair that you all grant me a months grace. In fact, lets all take a month off. Let's just party for December and come January we will be super responsible again as a group.

I see some difficulties. The only way this can work is if everyone agrees NOT to get sick, have car accidents, break laws, have power outages, need food or eat out. We have to agree not to shop, buy gas or need repair work done. This also means no babies arriving, no air travel, no attending movies. This would require that we stockpile in November and adjust natural laws so we can put a hold on illness and weather and human error.

Just in case that doesn't work out I may need to reconsider what can go from the December party calendar. I am thinking hard about establishing some pecking order for events and parties and using some criteria to help decide what stays and what goes. Criteria like: is this fun, am I having a good time, do I like the people here, how is the food, what is the dress code, do I have to bring something I have to make. I know this may not be a good list and I may have to alter it a little. I might have to include things like: does this nourish my soul, does it nurture my family, does it deepen my relationship with God.

I still think the food should be good.