Kindymycin

Christmas is coming and I have a two year old and a five year old. My wife and I are pretty stumped about what to get our kids for Christmas. The two year old is easy; he doesn't care, will be thrilled with a ball, and just happy to be included.

The five year old is very down to earth and grateful for anything, but he already has everything he needs because up to now we've tried to be smart about buying him things that will last and give him good enjoyment mileage. He has plenty of Legos, an assortment of figurines (farm animals, fantasy creatures, little play houses, action figures, cars.), plenty of outside balls and whatnot. He also doesn't need consumable stuff (has plenty of candy from Halloween, crayons, coloring books, crafty supplies)

He doesn't need more stuff, but we still want Christmas morning to feel special and exciting and we want him to have a good "Santa came!!!" experience. I like the idea of giving experiences like tickets to Disney on Ice or a voucher to an ice cream shop, but that just doesn't have the same effect for a five year old, cause he can't hold it and it's really just a promise for the future.

Any advice or suggestions would be really appreciated!

Thank you all and much love from me to you!

Humans are creatures of habit. So often we do things a certain way without really thinking about why we do it or why we do it that way. It's just the way we've always done it. It's so nice when we have those aha moments when it dawns on us there may be a better way to do something that removes complexity from our life.

Here are a few of mine:

1. It occurred to me that it takes the same amount of time to prepare for the day whether I do it the night before or the morning of, And for me warnings usually feel more crunched for time than evenings. So I started doing everything I could for the next morning the night before. Laying out my clothes, fixing my breakfast, laying out my morning hygiene items, packing my bag for work, etc. This ha really decompressed my mornings and given me less decisions to make first thing.

2. I realized that having notifications for email on my phone spurred me to react to them immediately, Even though the emails I receive rarely require immediate action. I disabled them all together and put a weekly calendar reminder to sit down at my computer and review my emails.

3. Picking what to cook for supper was always a chore every single day. Figuring out what we were in the mood for, do we have what we need to make that, etc. To eliminate this daily aggravation, I made a list of every supper I know how to cook and numbered them. Once a month I sit down with my list, roll a dice for everyday, and put down what's for supper each day So I don't have to think about it for the rest of the month.

What are some of your aha moments?

For me simple living is tied closely to my love of nature. I found that Emerson's Nature is available for free online. Been working my way through it slowly (some sections take a while to digest), but I've really been enjoying it and I hope you do too!

They're are so many great quotes from this one after another. What is your favorite(s) and why?