Today my kids (and my husband) go back to school so our Winter break is officially, truly over. It’s a little bit painful, those transitions back to regular schedule. We were delightfully lax over the past 2 weeks – with bedtimes, wake-ups, junk food intake, and screen time.
There was a fair amount of reading in our pyjamas.
December is very busy for me at work. Full days and extra shifts. I’ve come to enjoy the full-on nature of my work each Christmas season though and, I think, I’ve gotten better at figuring out how best to balance it out with our family life.
We’ve continued our Advent tradition of some small gift or activity each day leading up to Christmas and I really love doing that with my girls. We did things like movie nights, spa day (pictured below), getting a new book, baking cookies.
We continued our family tradition of The Great Christmas Tree Hung where we drive out slightly into the woods and cut down our own Christmas tree under the power lines. The results will vary and you will definitely NOT get a perfect looking tree but it’s always an adventure and it’s free! This year we brought along some friends who are originally from Nigeria and had never had a real tree at Christmas before. In the end, they probably thought we were crazy Canadians, but I think they had fun.
Every year, I lean more and more into deliberate coziness at this time of year. I hang up lights, I light candles, I make tea, I bake. Right about now it’s dark from around 4pm until 7:30 the next morning. And even when the sun is up, it’s often clouded over, rainy or drizzly. Getting ready for Christmas is a great time to hibernate a little – put on your pyjamas, pour a cup of tea, and read a book. It’s okay that it’s only 7:30pm because it’s pitch black outside anyway.
Peter gets off the same holidays as the girls so once those three were on break, I could go full tilt at work for a few days. I had one day off in that last stretch and we used it to tidy up our house so that we could feel clean and ready for Christmas Day. Peter and I have a little tradition that some evening before Christmas (usually the 23rd) we watch a Christmas movie, have a drink, and wrap presents together. I work pretty near a full day on Christmas Eve and have finally learned to keep the rest of that day super simple. Candlelight service at church then home to open the last Advent gift – matching jammies for the girls. My only task the night before Christmas is prepping cinnamon buns for the next morning!
Christmas morning came nice and early in our house – our kids were up before 5am and we only made them wait a little bit before we let them realize that we were also awake! Christmas with young kids is pretty magical. I know I have many years of sleeping in on Christmas ahead of me and so I don’t mind the few years of very early present opening right now. (A splash of egg nog in my coffee definitely helps!)
In the afternoon on Christmas Day we caught a ferry and headed into Vancouver for two nights where we celebrated with my brother and his family and my parents. We had a lovely relaxing time there and lots of delicious food. Then back home for the second round of family celebrations with Peter’s parents, his two brothers and their families, and his grandmother. After that we had 5 delightful days in which to recover from all our celebrating and we did practically nothing. I had a couple of short shifts at work in there and we spent one afternoon trying to find snow with moderate success. Enough for a snowball fight!
We celebrated a very lowkey New Year’s. We played several family games of Mario Kart, ordered pizza, made fancy drinks (Hugo Spritzes for Peter and I, sparkling water and grenadine for the girls), and watched the countdown in Ottawa. That’s at 9pm for us which meant the kids stayed up late and we didn’t have to!
All in all, a delightful time off and celebration of a beautiful holiday! I hope that 2025 ended for you in lovely ways and that there is much to look forward to in 2026!
Karissa Reads Books 
Happy New Year, Karissa.
Thank you! Happy new year to you!
Even though you mentioned the holiday season being calm and cozy, you guys truly do it up big! Advent gifts every day, plus there are lots of presents under the tree, riding ferries, snowball fights, tree cutting, games, movies, etc. Hahaha, you guys do it well! Nick, who works for a university, also gets to follow the holiday schedule (well, pretty close—Christmas Eve through the first Monday after the New Year—also had a hard time going back to normal. I attended a meditation class last winter because I was getting awfully anxious about the end of the semester, holidays, and leaving for my internship, and I remember the woman pointing out that everything in nature knows that it’s a time for rest, and yet we gear up and go faster because of holidays, and then we try to justify why we are allowed to rest to ourselves and others, when we should naturally be resting. I try to remember that.
I love Christmas and so my temptation is to try to do everything and then I’m stressed and tired and don’t have enough to give to the parts I truly care about. So I say no to extra get togethers and parties and our time with extended family is less focused on presents and more on just being together. And to be clear, my kids don’t get presents every day of Advent! There are some small gifts but it’s mostly about doing things together. For me, planning it out like that at the beginning of the month actually helps.
I had a very similar thought this fall! That every other mammal around me is getting ready to lie low through the winter so why would I push myself more? It’s okay to have lower energy seasons and enjoy being at home more.