5 Things You Can Do in January to Get Ahead for Next Christmas (Seriously!) [Episode 20]

Heidi  0:50

Hey there, friends. Welcome back to the Holiday Headstart Podcast. Today we are talking about five simple tasks you can do now to get ahead for next Christmas, and sharing a tip for taming future credit card bills.

 

Emily  1:04

Let’s kick things off with our tradition spotlight. Traditions are an important tool in building a healthy, happy, connected life.

 

Heidi  1:12

This week, we have a tradition for Groundhog Day. This might not be a holiday that you are used to celebrating, and we’re not sharing the suggestion, because you should feel pressured to add it to your calendar.

 

Emily  1:23

Right, we have a no pressure policy here at the Holiday Headstart Podcast. There is zero guilt or expectation that you should add anything to what you’re already doing or not doing. But if you’re looking for some ideas for how to add a little surprise and delight to a very minor holiday, this might give you some ideas.

 

Heidi  1:41

And it might also give you ideas for how to streamline or elevate a tradition that you’re already committed to. Sometimes hearing what works in one area can help us smooth out some friction in another area.

 

Emily  1:51

So with all that being said, today’s tradition spotlight is just to consider celebrating Groundhog Day. Because it’s such a silly, low key holiday, adding just a little sparkle can go a long way.

 

Heidi  2:02

As with any holiday, even the minor, ridiculous ones, we want to start by identifying our purpose. That will help us know what level of effort to put in. If your purpose is to add a little surprise to the day, you could serve breakfast or dinner on some Groundhog Day paper plates. You could buy a whole stack on Amazon. Just use what you need this year and then tuck away the rest for next year. Easy peasy. Just don’t forget where you put them. If, however, your purpose is to make the day special, you could print a coloring page or do a craft, or you could put up some simple decorations, like a banner.

 

Emily  2:36

While I was looking for Groundhog Day plates, I came across some cute honeycomb decorations. These are just little cardboard pictures with a tissue paper base that unfolds to support the picture. And those are nice because if you just use paper clips instead of adhesive to hold the base open, you can store them flat and reuse them next year. I do that with some of my back to school decorations.

 

Heidi  2:58

And if your purpose in celebrating Groundhog Day is to make memories, you could go outside and take photos of your loved ones, seeing their shadows, or, you know, not seeing their shadows. You know how that goes. Or you could buy some props and do a Groundhog Day photo shoot.

 

Emily  3:11

There are links to the plates, decorations, and photo props in the show notes, and we’d love to hear how you celebrate Groundhog Day. Come join us on Instagram @theholidayheadstart.

 

Heidi  3:21

One nice thing about Christmas is that it is not a surprise. Except for that last week in December, next Christmas is always going to be happening this year.

 

Emily  3:31

Another nice thing about Christmas is that a lot of what you do from year to year tends to be routine. Unless you like a lot of novelty in your celebrations, you can assume that much of what happened last year can be repeated this year.

 

Heidi  3:43

Because we are getting closer to Christmas every day, and because we know a lot of what needs to happen to pull those celebrations together, there’s a lot we can do to get ready for it in advance. Today, we are going to share five easy things you can do this month to get ahead for January. So kick us off with our first suggestion, Emily.

 

Emily  4:01

Since this quintile of the year, we are focusing on reflecting, let’s start by reflecting on the last holiday season. You could write your memories and reflections in a journal, if that’s handy. But if you’re looking for some guided prompts, check out the Holiday Headstart Reflection Journal. You can get the journal at the link in our show notes.

 

Heidi  4:20

Our journal has specific sections for reflecting on each of the eight areas of holiday intention: vision, planning, relationships, home, experiences, spending and personal well being. We look at what went well and what didn’t go well in each of those areas, and then we use that information to make our resolutions.

 

Emily  4:39

This is the part that’s going to help us with next Christmas. We identify what we want to be sure to repeat in the future, and also what we want to leave in the past.

 

Heidi  4:47

Now our golden rule of reflection is that we only answer the questions that are useful for us. So even though there are lots of questions on the page, absolutely do not feel obligated to answer all of them. I wrote them all and I don’t answer every question every year, but some years I have found some questions to be more useful than other years.

 

Emily  5:05

Yeah, they’re all just there because you don’t know what’s going to spark you know, the best reflection for you, and we would give you a friendly nudge to focus on those resolution questions. That’s where the real magic of reflection comes into play.

 

Heidi  5:19

The Reflection Journal also includes sections for planning your post holiday reset, so that you have a personalized roadmap for getting back to normal life, and there’s a final section for responses so you can have a quick chat with the people that you celebrate with. You can ask them what they most like about celebrating the holidays, what they don’t like, and maybe what doesn’t even matter to them.

 

Emily  5:39

That information can be so valuable to helping know where to focus your time and energy in the future. Use your resolutions and your loved ones responses to guide your decisions going forward. Maybe you need to find new recipes for your Christmas Eve meal, or take a hard look at whittling down your list of December activities.

 

Heidi  5:56

And then it’s time for our second get ahead task. Make a savings goal. Avoiding holiday debt is so important these days, and the key to doing that is making sure to save enough each month leading up to Christmas. Now please note that I am saying this to myself as much as I am saying it to anyone else. I did set up an automatic transfer each week from my checking to my savings, so I feel like I’m taking some grown up steps.

 

Emily  6:21

Ooh, that is a good one. I’ve got to do that.

 

Heidi  6:24

I’m also going to make sure to buy Target and Amazon gift cards on each month’s holly day. I’ve been pretty hit or miss with that in the past, but since I know I’m gonna end up shopping at those places eventually, whether it’s Christmas or not, it’s really not a risky investment. And I also spend a lot on Etsy, so I probably should see if they do gift cards too.

 

Emily  6:42

Oh yeah, that’s a good idea. That brings us to our third get ahead task. If you’re responsible for filling anyone’s stockings on Christmas, set up a stocking bag or bin for each stocking. This will let you gather small things all year long instead of trying to find everything in December, and then you can also easily see how much you have and who has more than others.

 

Emily  6:43

Yeah, that’s a real pitfall if you’ve got multiple kids.

 

Emily  6:49

Heidi’s been with me on Christmas Eves before, when I discovered, oh no, these are not even at all, or I just overbought for everyone. Like, why did I think this could all fit in here?

 

Heidi  7:20

In the Holiday Headstart Playbook, there are stocking stuffer idea pages for kids and adults. You can make a page for each of the stockings that you need to fill and tweak the suggestions to fit that person’s needs.

 

Emily  7:32

The first category of stocking stuffer is items that might need to be restocked. Anything that gets used regularly can go here—hair stuff, toiletries, toothbrushes, office supplies, school supplies, that sort of thing. These types of gifts are great to stock up on a little at a time throughout the year.

 

Heidi  7:49

And this is your friendly reminder that you can totally put practical items into a stocking and not be a scrooge. Now, a stocking full of socks and underwear would not be fun, but having some socks and underwear mixed in with some fun items really doesn’t detract from the excitement.

 

Emily  8:05

And we’ve got several categories of fun items. Think of consumables like bubbles and stickers for the kids or treats and lotions for grown ups. You can add any small items that your loved ones might collect, like trading cards or action figures. Grown ups can get more useful items like screen wipes and nail files, and you’ll still have plenty of room for the just for fun stuff like puzzles and card games.

 

Heidi  8:27

As you go through the year, Be on the lookout for items that fit your stocking categories. For example, those back to school sales in July can be a great time to stock up on crayons and markers.

 

Emily  8:38

And then just add all your purchases to your designated stocking bags or bins, and look at you being months ahead of the game.

 

Heidi  8:45

There are pages full of stocking stuffer suggestions in the playbook, and you can add your own ideas as you go through the year. Just, you know, don’t let buying ahead mean that you buy more than will fit into the stocking. As Emily mentioned, that is an easy trap to fall into. You’re just cramming stuff in on Christmas Eve.

 

Emily  9:02

Luckily I’ve got a little bit of stretch in the kids, but not too much.

 

Heidi  9:07

Or piling stuff next to it on the couch.

 

Emily  9:08

That’s frequently what we have to do.

 

Emily  9:13

Our fourth get ahead task is to undecorate with your future self in mind. Is there anything you can do now to make decorating next December easier? One tip is to photograph your decor before you take things down. This saved me last Christmas, because I couldn’t remember how I had put up my glitter houses the year before, and so when we were trying to do it, I was like, Wait, how did I make this work? And luckily, I had taken a picture. So you will love having a handy reference of what goes where next year.

 

Heidi  9:42

I have an album in my photos, just for this purpose. And it really does make redecorating so much easier down the road, if you’re someone that doesn’t like the decisions, of having to decide.

 

Emily  9:53

Yeah, I do not like the decisions, and that’s super smart to put it in an album, which I have not done. I had to search. I like just went back to December looking through, oh, good, there’s a picture. So gonna put that on my to do list.

 

Heidi  10:04

And I also try to pack away items based on where they’re displayed, rather than by type of decor. So I don’t keep all my garland in one place. I keep all of my kitchen decorations in one box and all my living room decorations in another box. That way it’s easy to just put it all back up again, and those are basically the only rooms I decorate, so that makes it easy to keep track of.

 

Emily  10:25

Our fifth get ahead tip for January is to gather your recipes now. If you want to print something, do it now while it’s fresh in your memory, because by next December, it will be a little hazy and you might not remember what site it was on. Or you can organize your recipes digitally. And I really like using the paprika three app. It is not overly fancy, but it really just does such a great job of saving your recipes, and while you’re working on them, your phone stays awake if while you’re cooking, that’s a feature I really love. And you can add in notes when you make it of what you want to remember next time you make it. And you can also put in a link to like the blog post on somebody on a food blog, for example. You can put that into the app, and the app will, like, slurp it in and turn it into a recipe in your app with a little picture. It’s just a great app. And it is free, I think, actually, I’m not sure. I know, I paid a couple bucks, and that was either to upgrade something to, like, get get rid of ads or something, or that’s how much it cost. But it was like a one time fee of, I think, like $3.

 

Heidi  11:32

And making those notes now before you put your recipes away for 11 months is so important. So if you made any tweaks, make sure to jot that down. Now, before you forget that you needed to double the casserole for Christmas morning, or you needed to swap out mayo for sour cream and the dip that everyone loved. By the time you’re making it in December, you’re going to be struggling to remember exactly what you did.

 

Emily  11:53

Well, this has really saved me, because I make this same two breakfast casseroles every Christmas Eve to have on Christmas morning to make things simpler. And oftentimes I go, I am so confident going into it, because I’ve made it so many times before that I can’t remember. Like, wait, what bread did I decide is the best bread to use in the french toast casserole? Because I’ve tried several over the years and can’t remember which one’s the favorite. But luckily I had recorded it in the app. And it’s same with the potato, bacon, egg casserole that I do. It calls for a certain amount of cheese, but it like kind of leaves, it’s flexible on what kinds of cheese. And so I’ve experimented with it over the years and figured out the ratio of pepperjack that’s not too pepperjackie for my kids. And luckily, I had recorded that in the app, so those little details will save you.

 

Heidi  12:46

Yay for those notes coming in handy to save us in a stressful moment.

 

Emily  12:51

Because who can remember from a year ago? I never can.

 

Heidi  12:54

We never will.

 

Emily  12:55

But I always think I will.

 

Heidi  12:57

Our fatal flaw. So those are our five January tasks. Reflect on December, start on your savings goal, set up your stocking bags, undecorate with next Christmas in mind, and gather and organize your holiday recipes. Now we just have to get it all done.

 

Emily  13:14

Yeah, let’s go. We got, we got stuff to do.

 

Emily  13:18

So in the previous episode, Episode 19, we talked about scheduling a monthly holly day to work on those get ahead tasks. We will continue sharing our suggestions on the podcast, but you may want to start a list of tasks you can do during your upcoming holly days. That will save you from the trap I’ve often fallen into of wanting to get things done in advance, but just not knowing where to start. So I don’t do anything.

 

Heidi  13:42

One of my goals this year is to use my holly days to organize my recipes. I did a great job a few years ago with Thanksgiving recipes, like it was perfect, but I haven’t done anything for Christmas, and right now it’s just a big stack of printed pages. Because I often like to combine parts of different recipes into one, I’m using the recipe template in the Holiday Headstart Playbook, plus that makes everything look cohesive, which I know does not help my cooking, but it does make me happier while I’m cooking. So that’s got to help improve my cooking in the long run, right?

 

Emily  14:12

For sure. And if you like having a printed page, that template does, like really nice print it out on your counter. We’d love to hear what you’re doing to get ahead this January for the holidays that are ahead, so connect with us on Instagram @theholidayheadstart.

 

Emily  14:27

Now it’s time for a Get a Headstart Tip. Each week we leave you with a small, actionable tip to help you get a head start on your holiday planning. This week’s get a headstart tip is add back to school expenses to your seasonal savings goals. Tell us more about it, Heidi.

 

Heidi  14:42

Well, as you may have noticed, December is really expensive. So many surprise expenses creep up on us, and they can often break the budget if we’re not careful. That’s why we want to make sure that we are saving early and often. But if you have young kids, another season of expenses that might catch you off guard is back to school season. After the holiday season, back to school season might be the biggest drain on your budget. The best way to address that is to start setting aside money now. You could add it to your holiday savings and have one big seasonal spending pot. Or you could have a separate category for back to school expenses. Do whatever will help you to avoid the shock of getting that credit card bill in September.

 

Emily  15:24

If you’re buying yourself gift cards every month, an easy way to save for a school expenses is to buy gift cards to the stores where you do most of your back to school shopping. I’m guessing it’s a lot of the same stores where you do a lot of your holiday shopping. So if you don’t use all your gift cards for school, you can use them for Christmas.

 

Heidi  15:40

Just make sure you have a secure, convenient place to store those gift cards. You’d hate to get to August and not be able to find what you put your money on.

 

Emily  15:48

Oh, for sure.

 

Heidi  15:50

Now let’s talk about what we’re working on this week. As a way to keep ourselves accountable and to give you some ideas of what you can do in advance for your own celebrations, we’re sharing what we’re working on this week. Emily, what’s on your to do list?

 

Emily  16:02

Well, I am on a decluttering journey that I had hoped to do before Christmas, but ran out of time, so I’m working on it now. It’s been ages since I did a full clean out of clothes and toys for my kids, and it needs to happen. There is a lot of things that need to go.

 

Heidi  16:18

Just calling it a journey, I knew it had to be intense.

 

Emily  16:22

Yeah, I’ll be a different person at the end of this, I think.

 

Heidi  16:26

Like all good journeys.

 

Emily  16:27

Yes. What’s on your to do list, Heidi?

 

Heidi  16:30

I am making my list of get ahead tasks for my upcoming hollydays. I have fallen into the trap in the past where it’s like, okay, I set aside time to do this, but then I don’t know what to do, and then I have to spend that time figuring out what to do, and then I have no time left to do the thing I figured out to do. So I’m gonna get ahead of the game and make my list now.

 

Emily  16:49

I love it, good for you.

 

Heidi  16:51

To wrap up the show, we’re sharing our nice list. Emily, what’s on your nice list this week?

 

Emily  16:55

Well, on my nice list, it’s twofold. On the nice list is my family, my parents and my siblings, for gifting me a little free library for my 40th birthday. And so the little free library is also on my nice list. They gave me a gift card so that I could pick out the one I wanted. And I kind of dithered for several months about which one I wanted and how I was going to get it installed. And then it got cold, but I decided, there was a Black Friday deal, so I decided to just go ahead and order it, and I won’t be able to fully install it until the spring, so I’ve got a temporary installation going on right now. But it’s so fun to have something new and just like pure joy, like it’s just for fun, like it does, it’s not stressful, it’s just, it’s just enjoyable. And every time I see it, it makes me smile. And I am just so excited to have this. And also, in the winter, it’s just nice to have, like, some little fun thing to keep me going through the worst months of the year.

 

Heidi  17:55

January’s bleak, but I haven’t seen it yet. I’ll have to come over and take a look. I’m excited. You picked out a cute one though.

 

Emily  18:01

I mean, you had to hear all of my, I really wanted the Doctor Who TARDIS library so, so bad, but it didn’t come in the easy care materials, and I don’t want to have to repaint it every year. So even though it made me very sad to not pick the TARDIS, I went with a regular one, but it’s still cute. It’s got like a cute roof line and all of that. Maybe I’ll post a picture somewhere.

 

Heidi  18:27

Makes me think of a little school house. It’s darling.

 

Emily  18:29

Yeah. What’s on your nice list, Heidi?

 

Heidi  18:32

Well, this is less exciting, but I’m putting Sterilite containers on my nice list. My whole life is, and especially my December is ruled by their latch bins. And honestly, I wouldn’t have it any other way. They’re so handy, they can hold a lot. They’re sturdy, and even when they’re full, they’re not too heavy for me to carry. And I have given this a lot of thought, and I think that given enough Sterilite bins, I could probably take over the world.

 

Emily  18:59

Yeah, it adds up.

 

Heidi  19:00

Yeah.

 

Heidi  19:03

That’s it for today’s episode. Remember our five get ahead tasks for January, and don’t forget to factor school expenses into your savings plan for the year.

 

Emily  19:10

Thank you so much for joining us, and we hope to see you here next week. If you enjoyed this episode, we would love it if you gave us a five star rating and review on Apple podcasts. As a new podcast, we really need all of the positive promo we can get.