November 9, 2023
Each year I create a photo book through Shutterfly to capture our “Team Slessman Year-in-Review”. It’s carefully curated and obviously captioned in my detailed, yet witty voice. I gift them to the grandparents and my sister (who started the photo book tradition), and my kids look through them throughout the year, commenting on how cute they used to be. How amazing is that, right? It’s Instagram-worthy, folks.
Do you want to know what the behind-the-scenes looks like during the careful curation of my annual photo book? It’s scary ugly. I mean…ugly. Do you remember what the inside of the Griswolds’ house looked like in the aftermath of their Christmas Eve shenanigans? It’s like that. There’s weeping. There’s yelling with sometimes not nice words. I give up and quit…only to immediately and guiltily come back to it. Yelling at myself that I should have started earlier in the year when I had ALL the time. Super late nights and blurred vision. I swear, I start this book with such anxiety each November and make empty promises to myself about starting sooner and never doing this ever again and that I should take better pictures.
And then it’s done. And somehow, out of the ashes, comes this book that recaps our year gone by, and I’m just so grateful that I did it.
[I’m honestly exhausted just by describing this process to you.]
But you are catching me, full anxiety-mode about this book, in the midst of “November-it’s almost Christmas-but wait I’m hosting Thanksgiving, I need to get my house ready-but wait I’m out of town the next two weekends-but what about Christmas presents-but wait I need to train for my December half-marathon, why did I think that was a good idea-but what about my book and my Thanksgiving turkey?” time of year.
Sound familiar?
This time of year is crazy, y’all. Here’s my annual reminder to just stop where you are as you read this and take a breath. I just did that as I wrote that sentence.
I think I can speak for the masses when I say that we run on fumes this time of year. There’s a million things to get done. There’s a million people to see. A lengthy checklist that just keeps growing. And just like the ugly scary behind-the-scenes of my book making, there is the wild chaos within and around us that grows bigger as our checklist grows and our time runs out.
What if we learn how to make some simple adjustments to the expectations we put on ourselves and others during this upcoming holiday season? I have a very hard time saying “no” to things and I like to be in control. But what if I did the photo book in January, after the dust of the season settled? What if I bought a pre-cooked turkey for Thanksgiving rather than proving to my family that I have the cooking prowess big enough for both major holidays coming up when I really, well…don’t? What if I decided that my kids’ clothing didn’t have to match for my annual “scramble-to-take-an-appropriate-Christmas card photo” this year? (I mean – that’s crazy talk right there for you).
I’m sure there are many things that each of you could make a slight adjustment to, or a slight change of attitude towards. Maybe the slight adjustment of an expectation would take away from some of the craziness. I’m not sure. I haven’t tested this theory out yet. LOL.
But I really do think that even if we allowed ourselves to step back and make a slight change, beautifully curated things will still rise from the ashes. We can do hard things, right? Maybe we can enjoy the process a little more so that the behind-the-scenes look more like the outside of the Griswolds’ right after their beautiful white lights shut down the entire neighborhood and the Hallelujah chorus sings from the heavens.
I kind of love the sound of that.
But now, I’m back to the book that is staring at me on my open Shutterfly tab on top of my screen. Let’s see if I lean into my own advice, shall we?
Until next time,
Jess