Delight Your Family At Christmas With A Gift From The Heart

Each holiday season, one of the challenges every family faces is finding a way to manage Christmas spending. As extended families grow, the pressure to spend more and more grows with each December. But many families today have chosen creative ways to give to each other, without spending money, especially at large family gatherings.

Of course, this trend is historically what the holiday season was all about-sharing the love and the joy of family, rather than expensive gifts, at a darkening time of the year. One way to renew that sense of family love and joy is to share with family members favorite tales and stories of the holiday season.

It really is simple. Everyone has a favorite song or story-or even a poem-which brings the Christmas season alive. Reading or reciting these traditional holiday tomes is a wonderful gift between family members, and easy to prepare:

The first step is to decide which family members will read or recite their favorite stories each year. There are many possible ways to start-drawing straws or numbers, a few weeks before, or picking one family to start, then moving to others, in each consecutive year. However it's done, everyone should have their spotlight, every few years.

Finding material is easy. Most Christmas stories, from various Santa Claus tales, to different versions of the Nativity, can be easily downloaded from online sources. The pieces then can be memorized by brave family members, or bound together neatly for reading, by the rest of us.

A bit of rehearsal can help anyone prepare for such an event. Even a performance for family should be special enough at the holidays, to warrant proper preparation.

Some family members-especially the youngest-may want to make up their own Christmas tales, to recite. These can become unique family traditions, themselves.

Choose a time when everyone is together, to share your stories-like after a big meal- and a place where everyone can gather, seated and comfortable-like a living room or great room.

One family member can be designated as the evening's MC, to keep things moving along, to introduce each piece, and offer encouragement to those cousins who may experience sudden shyness, in front of a group. Each story session should be a manageable length-forty-five minutes to an hour, tops. That way, no one gets bored and everyone looks forward to this tradition, at next year's gathering.

If you're looking for an inexpensive way to share the joy and love of the holiday season at your next family gathering, consider sharing favorite stories, poems and songs with each other. It's a great way to spread holiday cheer and entertain each other at the same time.