Posted in Family life
For some reason I feel like I'm being swept along on a wave of busyness lately! It feels like Thanksgiving and Christmas are sneaking up on me. Every year my husband and I struggle with finding the balance between the many "good" things we can do over the holidays -- while wanting to make sure we make time for the "BEST" things. Even with an emphasis on serving others, giving rather than getting, etc., it can still be easy to fall prey to being too busy and loosing our focus of a Christ-centered, family oriented Christmas season.
As I looked at my calendar today, I realized that I must write down some important appointments like - our family tradition of riding the Christmas train at a local park, starting our advent book (we're reading Tabitha's Travels this year), other family reading time of special Christmas books, a day/evening at the beach (another Christmas tradition since we live in FL and the weather is beautiful), the night we will shop for our tree, each child's special shopping day to pick gifts for brother, mom and dad, etc.
I am finding if I don't write down these things as appointments, then they may get pushed aside, or at the very least, feel rushed. I've also started writing down my appointment with God, choosing to not schedule anything during that time. This isn't my quick daily devotions, but rather an hour or so once a week to spend more quality time in God's word and prayer. Believe it or not, I've had to tell someone, "No, I can't attend _________." because I have another appointment! Of course, they don't know that the appointment might be my weekly special God-time, or the afternoon I set aside to bake with my son, but that doesn't matter. What DOES matter is that I kept my appointment -- choosing the "best" over something that is "good".
Although it is still a challenge to balance it all, seeing my children's faces light up when they see their name on my calendar is helping me to keep to this new way of cutting through the busyness and keeping the "main thing, the main thing." 
