{"id":1657,"date":"2015-11-26T22:16:48","date_gmt":"2015-11-26T09:16:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/asyouwish.co.nz\/blog\/?p=1657"},"modified":"2016-01-13T14:10:09","modified_gmt":"2016-01-13T01:10:09","slug":"how-to-stress-less-this-christmas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/asyouwish.co.nz\/blog\/how-to-stress-less-this-christmas\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Stress Less this Christmas"},"content":{"rendered":"
12 Days of Christmas Ideas 2015 \u2013 Day 4<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/h5>\n

A little pre-planning can go a long way towards reducing Christmas stress, which is why today’s idea is a planning one.<\/p>\n

\"Christmas

My family’s Christmas in the early days.<\/p><\/div>\n

I’m from a family of five girls. If you’re thinking ‘Oh your poor Dad!’ no need to\u00a0worry, the son-in-laws and grandsons have finally tipped the numbers in his favour. We are also quite a busy bunch and even when we are on holiday there is always a\u00a0lot of activity. One day while on holiday together, and having just survived another last minute call to gather as a full family at another location, my sister (mother of 3 boys under 5) and I got to\u00a0talking about how stressful it was to rally our families of pre-schoolers and get somewhere in 20 minutes – after all it can take that long just to get the kiddies to put on their shoes!<\/p>\n

\"My

My family’s Christmas now.<\/p><\/div>\n

Next time the holidays came around I was determined to reduce the stress and enjoy our time together. I figured that a written schedule\u00a0for the busiest part of our time together (this just happened to be Christmas Eve through to Boxing Day) would be\u00a0very helpful in achieving this. So I gave my parents\u00a0and my sisters a call and\u00a0explained that I wanted to be able to enjoy our time together with as little stress as possible – which was something they all wanted too. I\u00a0asked them what their hopes,\u00a0plans and expectations\u00a0were for this period of time. We also agreed that the schedule was flexible – we could easily change anything on the schedule as long as everyone was consulted. I typed up the schedule and sent out\u00a0copies to everyone.\u00a0All my family were happy and it worked well – yay!<\/p>\n

Now I get\u00a0that being this kind of organised is not for everyone, it really does depend on what your family is like.\u00a0For our busy and super active family it worked well. But let’s just strip this idea back\u00a0to the basics for a moment – stress\u00a0comes when relationships are put under strain and let’s face it Christmas comes with straining factors. So why not\u00a0try these 3 basic principles:<\/p>\n