HANDLING HOLIDAY STRESS!

The holidays always bring the best memories to me, but they also bring the most amount of stress too.

Growing up, I remember having huge holiday parties with over 20 guest at my place and my mom doing all the cooking. I remember the smell of my mom’s home cooking filling the house and the laughter of everyone’s stories filling the rooms. But I also remember the struggle of putting up our 18 foot Christmas tree. Yes, we have an 18 foot Christmas tree. And while the tree is beautiful, it’s also very stressful.

With the holidays in full swing our stress levels are on the rise. But don’t worry, I've got some tips and tricks to help you relieve some of your stress this holiday season.

Stop and breath

When it comes to the holidays, we all do way too much! Just stop, and take a deep breath. Instead of feeling the need to take on all the responsibilities, delegate to family and friends.

If YOU are doing the cooking, ask someone else to help with shopping. Simply give them a list of the items you need and this will save you a few hours of your day. If you are going to someone else’s home, insist that you bring something so they don’t have to worry about every aspect of the meal. Offer to bring desserts, or appetizers or even the beverages.

Gift wrapping can also cause a lot of unnecessary holiday stress. My mom used to stay up all hours of the night wrapping gifts. Try to schedule time to do it ahead of time. If you can’t find the time, have your children help. Have your kids wrap gifts for each other. As we got older, my mom would box the gifts so we couldn't see what was inside and we’d just wrap the box. It helped her a lot and we didn't know what our gifts were.

Laugh more!

Sometimes we get so involved with our everyday stress that we forget to laugh. If you mess something up, laugh over it. It’s not the end of the world. If your gifts don’t come out as nicely wrapped as you’d like, who cares, the paper just gets torn off anyway. Let your children help too and don’t stress over the Apple Pie not being perfect but instead encourage them to help you. Reminisce over older memories and just laugh. You can even play old holiday family films and laugh about the jokes that took pace. Every year my mom creates a family video…but, we've never seen one of them so we laugh about it. This year might be a good year to take them out and play them while we help with Christmas dinner.

Shut down!

Turn off the electronics, shut down the e-mails and just spend time with your family and friends. If you’re on PTO time, work e-mails can wait. Turn off your cell phone and don’t worry about the content, ding or messages but rather the people around you and the conversations that are around you, I guarantee they are more important than the messages on your phone.

Always remember, the holidays are about being with loved ones, don’t stress so much if something isn't perfect, chances are no one will know or care.

^Alysha