Your Christmas To-Do List: Are You Checking It Twice?

Christmas is a great time of year. Seriously, it’s great. I mean, the amount of times we even say the word “great!” during the festive season should be indicative of how amazeballs it is.

Let’s be real, Christmas is “Christmas”! It can be amazing, fun, stressful as heck, and completely overwhelming all at the one time. And the only word that seems to keep everyone on an even keel throughout it all is: “great”. So we’ll roll with that.

Think about it; when your Gran buys you that Christmas jumper than you’ve only ever seen worn as a dare on the “12 Pubs of Christmas” — what do you say? “Great! Thanks Gran!”. And so, off she hobbles, all delighted with herself.

Then, your brother brings over his 2 year old exorcist of a child who INSISTS on attempting to untie your laces (and everyone else’s) every 5 minutes, and your lovely brother asks you to “mind the little one” for a while. What do you say to that? “Of course!” And when he senses your hesitation and his guilt makes him ask twice, you reiterate your “of course!” with“I don’t mind at all, it’ll be… ‘great’.”

No wonder adults don’t believe in Santa. Not one of us would make it past the naughty list when it comes to keeping it real. But when it comes to your actual Christmas list, how are you preparing yourself for the big day? Are you checking it twice? You’d better be, because a day without Christmas hiccups is highly unusual, but a day full of them will give you more stress than you want to deal with. Especially when you’re trying to have a time out and spend some quality time with your loved ones (I mean, most of them are actually nice people).

So, I was thinking about what I’d put on my Christmas to-do list. But here’s the thing; I’m a vegan, I don’t eat chocolate, I don’t cook turkey (heck, I can just about boil vegetables), and I’m not really the typical family kind of person. But then, I was also thinking, when is Christmas ever typical for anyone?!

That’s what is so amazing about this time of year. It brings so many people together in so many kinds of miraculous ways (I don’t mean the saintly kind, but that too, if that’s your thing). What I mean is, people are so much more welcoming, friendly, and kind at this time of year (once you get past the shopping rush on Christmas eve, that is).

Rather than stick to just my own list, I also had a chat to Paul from the Buckets team about what he thinks is important to be prepared for on Christmas Day. Paul has a family of his own (i.e. he’s a real grown up and not this 30 year old who still goes home every year for her Aunty’s home cooking), so I figured he was a good guy to ask.

So, with a bit of input from Paul and some of my own tips and “beauty of hindsight” (I still have time to get it right this year!), here are some items for your Christmas to do list that you can add into Buckets right now.

1. Take The Batteries Out Of The Fire Alarm If It’s Less Than 3 Feet Away From The Stove.

Now, clearly you want to have an actual working fire alarm in close proximity, but your alarm going off every 10 minutes really isn’t going to put you in a festive mood when you’re trying to get that turkey going. If it makes you feel any better, I set mine off a least once a month and I don’t even cook meat — ever. I just, um, forget. I was that kid whose school report always said ‘easily distracted.’

2. Clean Your Toilet

Everyone is going to judge you by the state of your toilet. I’m sorry, but it’s true. You know all that dust at the very back that you think no-one can see? They can, and they will. There’s ‘everyday clean’ and there’s ‘visitor clean’. Know which is which, it’ll serve you well. And not just at Christmas.

3. Don’t Get Any Flies In The Ice

This can actually happen really easily. You pour in the water, set down the container, go do something else, Mr.fly comes along and goes for a swim (to his death — RIP), and you have a corpse taking residence in your ice bucket. Whilst I’ve never personally seen a fly make its way into an ice holder, I have had one fly into a pool of candle wax (true story, I documented it. On Instagram). So beware, there may be an epidemic at large. They clearly have some kind of deathwish thing going on. Drowning or cremation; personally I’d rather be frozen — they could wake up in the year 4050 when flies have taken over the world. Or not. Probably not.

Anyway, don’t get flies in the ice. Your guests won’t like it. And don’t tell them this story, they probably won’t like it either.

4. Don’t Run Out Of Toilet Paper

Oh, this is a biggie. If you’ve ever been in this situation, you know how much of a biggie it is. Don’t be a meanie, go and stock up, and don’t get the lousy 2 dollar stuff either. That stuff is like sandpaper. Nor is it reasonable to use the “oh, there are baby wipes in there if anyone gets stuck” excuse; they’re ADULTS. Next thing you’ll be locking the bathroom door and digging a hole in the back garden instead. Actually, then you wouldn’t have to do the super visitor clean… wait, NO, bad idea.

BUY GOOD TOILET PAPER. Be a good person. Someday, you will need that toilet roll in someone else’s house. And karma will be waiting.

5. Get A Decent Music Selection Going

You need some mood setting music in the background. We’re talking “Christmassy’” but not “Michael Bolton” Christmassy. You know your friends better than I do, so do your research; who do you think I am? Santa?

6. Do Not Lose Sight Of Small Animals

You love your gerbil. Your kids love your gerbil. Your 80 year old Great-Aunt will most likely not love your gerbil.

7. If You Can’t Cook, Don’t Cook

Know your talents. If you’re not the best cook in the world, don’t let your ego land you in the kitchen. Maybe you can play with the kids to give the parents a break, or play guitar later in the evening. There’s nothing like a good Christmas Day singsong! Or what about video games? If you’re good at video games, you can basically avoid all of the Christmas chaos by saying you’re “minding” the kids and then let them watch you play with their video games all day.

8. Don’t Forget To Sign Your Name On Your Christmas Cards

If there are any cards you’ll be handing over in person, double check right now that you’ve signed your name. You think I’m kidding, but I’m not. I’m using the fact that I was ill as an excuse, but this Christmas I almost sent two cards to the wrong addresses (3 times), and I completely forgot to sign my name on a card I posted to one of my Auntie’s. She spent about a day trying to figure out who it was from (and there I was thinking I was a special snowflake).

9. Make Any Child Who Hasn’t Seen Home Alone Watch At Least One: It’s A Rite Of Passage

Everyone remembers their first viewing of “Home Alone”. You owe them this. They’ll be riveted within minutes and you’ll have extra time and space to mingle! It’s a win-win.

10. Have Fun!

Ah look, things will go right, things will go wrong, people will get on great, and people will argue — it’s Christmas, that’s what it’s all about. If everything went to plan, it wouldn’t feel like Christmas at all. So have fun and check in with us over on Twitter to let us know how your weekend is going — we’d love to hear all of your stories. And HAPPY CHRISTMAS!

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