A couple months ago I said something rude to my sister. It didn’t even really make sense, but it was definitely potentially rude.
There we were, planning Thanksgiving, who would bring the sweet potatoes (me) and who would make the rolls (her) and who would cook the turkey (mom), and Marcy said that we didn’t really need cranberry bread because last year no one ate it, probably because there were too many carb-y side dishes, what with the stuffing (mom) and the mashed potatoes (me) and the even more rolls (her).
Now, I don’t think it’s technically possible to have too many carb-y side dishes, but I’m willing to suppose that people like to save their desert-type appetites for the pies.
Still, I was reluctant to skip the cranberry bread: it’s a tradition. In fact, here’s a picture of me at seven-ish, making cranberry bread with Dad. Dad wasn’t exactly a big presence in the kitchen, so baking with him every year was special.
Real men zest their oranges.
So Marcy pulled out her notes from last year. That’s right. After our Thanksgiving feast at her fancy house last year, she sat down and wrote notes about what worked and what didn’t. And there, in black-and-white, was proof that no one eats the cranberry bread, at least, not in the kind of quantities that justify valuable oven space.
Marcy is a little bit organized. Whenever she makes a dish, she makes notes on the recipe: how it turned out, any modifications she made, and how her kids liked it. Whenever her kids get sick, she keeps track of symptoms (date and time they appear) and medicines (doses and times) in a little notebook. She even keeps her digital photos in labeled computer folders so she knows which she’s printed out so far.
I only know which photos I haven’t printed out yet because I haven’t printed any in approximately two and a half years.
But as part of my resolutions this year, I hope that taking notes will work for me.
To get me started, here’s what worked and didn’t for Christmas this year. All I have to do is read this list in early November, and our next Christmas season will be even better. Which, if we don’t get the by-now-traditional stomach bug, will not be hard to do.
Notes on Christmas 2008:
1. You want to do Christmas cards. Even if you think you really don’t, you do, so buy the stamps, order a photo card from Costco, write the letter. Start canvassing for addresses December 1st; mail by the 15th.
2. You always buy too many small presents from Dollar Tree and Wal-Mart and the dollar spot at Target. Remember the “Something they want, something they need, something to wear, something to read” idea for gifts. Or, buy each kid a 25-ish gift and then only a few smaller ones to open. Chapstick, Pez, fun toothbrushes, gum, and slinkies are big hits in the stockings.
3. Presents that brought the biggest smiles: kids fingernail polish from Grampa, plastic beads for making bracelets and necklaces, and the ponies. But you knew that. The stocking swap at Well-Rounded Woman was definitely worth it; thanks Robyn!
4. Sally, Susan, and Spot loved the Jesse Tree. You need to add to the ornaments/scripture stories. This year there were only 15 days of prophets/foreshadowings of Christ. (In addition to some of the traditional devotions, I added Moses and the brass serpent, Samuel the Lamanite, Alma, the Brother of Jared, Jacob, Micah, King Benjamin, and Lehi and the liahona).
Mormon Jesse Tree. (Yes, we believe in David's father Jesse.)
5. When Dick says we shouldn’t get each other gifts, what he really means is that he’s too preoccupied to get you anything. So get yourself something and tell him thanks. Also, he really likes it if you let the kids think that some of the gifts you spend hours finding, buying, and wrapping are from him.
6. The neighbor gifts of clementine oranges (“Orange you glad it’s Christmas?”) were good. The girls loved delivering them. Great family activity the first few Mondays in December.
7. People may not appreciate cranberry bread at Thanksgiving, but they do still love the Christmas Danish Pastry. Now is not the time to cut back on exercise.
I think that’s about it. Oh, one more: If you do want to get a family picture for the card, think about this when the weather is still nice. Because kids and pictures? Hard. Kids and pictures and sub-zero temperatures? INSANE, where insane means “streaming snot” and “red, freezing hands” and “hypothermic crankiness.”
Speaking of photos, it’s entirely likely that I’ll never get around to organizing them. At this point, it would be easier to get the kids to age backwards and take more photos. But next Christmas? Is going to rock.
What works for you?
Jane
p.s. There’s one more day to enter the Walking With Dinosaurs giveaway.
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Great idea on the note-taking. I can take a tip or two from you and add some of my own for next year. I’ll have to get your Jesse tree info too. Love it when you do all the hard work and I steal the ideas!
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Glad you posted! I’ve been having withdrawals, seriously! I notice this was supposed to be Wednesday’s post but I realized I needed a Jane fix and checked and there was a post! So now that I took four sentences to say what I could have in one, go girl! I used to be organized but am not anymore. I thought your card was adorable, who needs a whole family pic?, and your sister sounds great but she’s giving me a complex.
Oh, and I tagged you on my blog. Don’t know if you do that kind of thing but thought I’d let you know.
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Wow! I never thought about taking notes! How organized! You don’t have to be as organized as your sister! Be yourself!
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Kim@ForeverWherever —
“Wow! I never thought about taking notes! How organized!”
Why do I get the feeling you’re being sarcastic?
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Your sister sounds extremely organized. I need to get there. Maybe I should start with my digital photos.
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My book has 30 prophecies of Christ’s birth in it (December chapter) you could use for your Jesse tree. Or you could find more on your own by reading Jesus the Christ, which has a chapter on this subject.
Your notes are great–many are applicable to me. I may just print these out and save them for myself!
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I agree on the Christmas cards. It’s really discouraging how fewer and fewer people send them out every year. The Christmas card sections at the stores were about 1/4 their usual size in 2008.
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I love the photo of you with your dad. Does your sister have that one labeled as printed? Just joking. I’m in the same club as you: Not printed photos in at least 2 1/2 years. I do keep my hard drive backed up frequently.
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That is a great idea! I know I mentally take notes a lot of times, but those mental notes don’t stay in there long enough. Lol!
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Wowzie! That is organized to the max!
I write out a ton of lists…but notes? That’s amazing!
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Jane, what great ideas! I should write some of those down (esp. Christmas Card and pressie preferences/themes in my 2009 diary for Nov 1 – to remind me).
I think what might work for me is to start organising myself in November. All the direct family birthdays that *I* should worry about are over by then, and we don’t have Thanksgiving, so Nov. is a good time to get a picture organised, either of the whole family or just M. There’s unlikely to be M+1 by Nov this year, so just M.
* Start writing cards in Nov, and maybe for the first time, contemplate a letter, and get that written by mid-November.
* Love the baking side of things, found a great gingerbread recipe in 2008, so start making my rum balls, white christmas, gingerbread BY 15 Dec.
* Organise the families about where we are for which meal on Christmas day. Start nagging in oh, September, and not-too-subtley dropping hints about what we’ll do and if brekky/lunch/dinner should be at our house.
* Tell, no, I mean ask, all of M’s grandparents to take off the packaging of any gifts before wrapping the pressies. I’m sure trying to keep an excited three year old off me while trying to undo metal twist-ties will be no more fun than doing the same with an excited two year old.
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Your blog made the voting list for the MMB January spotlight. Be sure to tell your readers to go vote for you!
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I haven’t printed photos in even longer. Except for recently when I HAD to.
Now, I can’t believe how much your girls look like you when you were little. And did you notice how much Dick looks like your dad?! Holy crap!
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I’ve been telling myself to write down the “self-editor reviews” I do in my head, but I’ve yet to commit them to paper. Thanks for the little push I need to start!
*I followed you from WFMW*
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