Works for Me Wednesday: The concept of the three gifts

Since the summer when the "Santa can bring me that" started, we've been discussing with our dear child the concept of the three gifts. Simply put, we tell her that if three gifts were good enough for Jesus, they are good enough for her.

It has forced her to really weed out the drivel of just wanting everything. She wants a Barbie themed Christmas. That's fine. We can deal with that. We have the Barbie Vet, Barbie Doggie Park and the Barbie Glam Vacation House. (I found the BGVHome for $40.00 at Toys R Us after Amazon pre-saled it for less, but never received it and wasn't slated to have it until well into the new year.)

Now, it isn't that we couldn't afford to do more. It isn't that I'm not having a hard time thinking, "Will that fit into her stocking?" We think that it is important to concentrate on the reason we are celebrating the season. We have lavished many lovely (clearance) items on K-, with the outcome turning into a Hanukkah style Christmas, since she suffered from gift opening fatigue. We have found that our best way to deal with Christmas is to go themed and go small. I mean, last year when she announced, "I want that!" and I realized the commercial she was watching was for shampoo, I knew that we had to nip the "I wants!" in the bud. When I told her that it was for shampoo, she laughed and said, "Oh."

That is what works for us!

Smiles in my day:
- Beginning our Jesse Tree Advent devotions in the evening.
- Julia and I resolved to have a better day. I put forth a very conscious effort to have a much better day with even the most demanding customers.
- Though we have lost our friends as walkers with us in the morning, we're still hoofing it and having a great time. They said it is too cold for them!

Have a great day!