I am radically changing our expectations for Christmas. With the strong emotional support of my older children we are greatly reducing the “presents” aspect.

I wrote a post here explaining it better, but the bottom line is my intention of reducing anxiety and the ridiculous commercialistic expectations.

In reality, it’d take a bucket load of presents to produce the capped teeth, artificially white smiles of delight that one sees on TV when Christmas is portrayed.

And even if I could afford to heap expensive presents on children, what message would I be sending? That ‘things’ make one happy?

I greatly prefer simplicity, a more austere lifestyle. My mom, now 77, has often remarked on the fact that I’ve always lived beneath my means. Not being in debt gives me the peace of mind I need in order to calmly parent a large family. Not owning stuff that traumatized children can steal, nor obsessing over the fact that everyone drives a better car and dresses way more fashionably than I, is emotionally freeing.

If I’d have told my children to make a list, they’d have been stumped. We have a DVR and fast forward through ads, we don’t receive catalogs nor advertising circulars in the Sunday paper as I read it online. We don’t browse through malls or see store specials. They only know about stuff that they hear about from classmates.

We’re pooling what I’d saved up to spend, putting it all together to buy an emachine or two, depends on the deals I can get, and my parents are very generously chipping in. The computers hold more games than they can ever play, more books and magazines to read and, most importantly, programs and tools that they need for their academics.

Somehow, in this most destructive of homes, where traumatized children often react so violently to rules, love or logic, our computers have survived the storms. If anything, the kids have taken impressive care of them, never raging at the computer tables, nor knocking them anywhere in anger.

My 22 year old son will help me set this all up on Christmas Eve, the kids’ll be happy on Christmas Day and practicality will prevail. This was something we needed, which makes me feel better about spending the money and the rest of our day will be spent eating the tons of food that everyone will bring.

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