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Whatever happened to looking forward to the holidays; the anticipation and good cheer, spending quality time with your family and in general, just enjoying yourself? Where have we gone wrong? By the time the holidays arrive, we're so stressed out and overwhelmed there is little room for enjoyment. Advertising bombards our children and ourselves with what we need to do and have to be happy. Most of those things, we just don't need.

If you wish the upcoming holidays were already over, its time you took back what has been taken away.

A busy family tends to go in many directions at once. Figure out what is most important to you and your family this holiday season and work in that direction. Planning is important and in order to keep from feeling overwhelmed, you might not do everything you'd like to do, but the things you do will be that much more enjoyable for it.

Be realistic and don't set your expectations so high or cram your schedule so full you can't focus on the good things and enjoy them. Pare activities down if you have to. Make time to go see your child's play or band concert. Make time for yourself too. Share an evening out with your husband to see a Christmas play or concert.

Having a family meeting to get everyone's input is a good family activity. Make some hot cocoa and a plate of cookies and get everyone at the table. You can avoid last minute surprises, find out what everyone wants to do, needs to do and any activities they want to plan. Talk about family traditions and the importance of including them in your plans. Put everything on a calendar well in advance to avoid conflicts.

Bake cookies and prepare pies weeks ahead of time and freeze them. Don't put off decorating the house until the week before, that just adds to the stress of the week. Instead, decorate gradually so that when that last week comes, you are mostly done with that. Involve the kids in decorating the house. It wouldn't hurt if they decorated a few cookies too. Preparing in advance reduces the last minute crunch to get it all done.

One way to reduce the stress of shopping is to do it in advance and do it on-line. Make a list of gifts to buy and do it ahead of time. When they arrive, take a few minutes out of the day to wrap one or two. You probably won't save much money once shipping is added in, but you'll save on gas, stress and time.

Most importantly, make sure you get enough sleep. Lack of sleep increases the stress we feel, both on our minds and on our bodies.

Taking back the holiday season and enjoying it means deciding what this time of year means to you and your family and making that your holiday tradition.

Learn more about this author, MJ Logan.
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