Like I told you guys on the Christmas 2013 post, ever since I was 16, I dreamed of having a Christmas without any presents.  I was 16 when I read an article in a LDS magazine for youth about a family who spent all the Christmas money they would have spent on themselves to buy presents for an orphanage and dropped off all the wrapped gifts on the front door before ringing the doorbell and  running away. The author was not excited at the time of the prospect of no presents but after hiding in the bushes and seeing the children’s faces light up when they opened the door, she said she felt so much joy and that Christmas ended up being her most favorite Christmas of all time.  I was so touched when I read that story and promised myself that I would do that one day when I had a future family of my own.  That I wasn’t going to do it just once, but to make it a family tradition every several years. 

So after much coaxing, my husband was on board with me!  He loves, loves, loves spoiling me and the kids with presents and surprises, so it was really really hard for him.  But after telling him how it was my childhood dream and how much I wanted to do it, he agreed that he would do it this time and THIS TIME ONLY! This will be the first and the last year we would ever do such a ridiculous thing.  Haha.  Well, we will see about that! 😉  We also told our family and relatives to not get presents for us but to donate for our cause(I sent them a list of possible ideas), or just skip us for Christmas, but at the last minute I did change my mind and told our parents that they could get a present for our kids(but not for me or Jay) since we all met up at my parents’ house afterwards to open presents and the thought of our kids just sitting there while they watched all their cousins open presents was a bit too sad for us.  

The main reason why I wanted to do this was because I didn’t want my kids to automatically associate Christmas with getting presents, making a Santa’s wish list and all the materialistic things.  Because that is not what Christmas is about.  Christmas is the opposite, it’s all about giving.  And sacrificing.  Because that’s what Jesus did.  All he did was give and sacrifice when he was on this earth.  And we are celebrating his birthday so we should give a present to him.  That is what it’s all about.  And the best present we could give him is our choice, our free agency to choose the right.  To serve and help others.  To love others.  To do good to others.  When you think about it, God gave us everything we have.  Every single experience, possession, wealth, happiness, it is all because God had given it to us.  So what do you give to someone who has everything in the universe and has the power to get everything he wants?  Our agency to choose the right.  Because that is one thing he can’t take away from us.  That is one thing he cannot control.  It is the only gift we could give him that is not his.

So now that my two oldest kids are old enough to understand, and I didn’t want them to associate Christmas=presents for themselves and what they want to get, I wanted them to associate Christmas=Jesus Christ. Celebrating his birthday by giving to others.  Because what we do to others is just as what we do to him.  

I am aware that it’s mid-March and I am posting our Christmas day post just now.  I kind of wanted the Holiday season to be completely over before posting, because I didn’t want people to think this was a big deal and I didn’t want to draw too much attention over this. I personally believe in doing good without people knowing and doing it in secret.  To me, that is the true spirit of giving.  Some people give in front of other people for the sake of gaining respect or attention, and that is just not the right way to go.  You should give to others because you want to help them.  You shouldn’t have a motive to boast to others what a good person you are, or to gain attention. I wanted to keep this a secret and never blog about it, but last year on that Christmas post, I promised that I would keep my readers updated so I have to keep my word. The second reason is because I thought it’d be great to contact the companies I’ve worked with in the past and ask for donations! I was always the one receiving gifts from companies for myself, but I thought it would be great to have them donate for me to give to the people in need. And I realize there’s something they need to receive in return, so I promised them that I would list the companies and credit them. It was fun getting gifts using our own money, but I knew I could give to more people if I had the companies donating as well.

Anyway, so on Christmas Eve, we wrapped up all the gifts and put it aside, and we put one present under the Christmas tree that was for us, and one present for each of our kids that was from Santa, that they got to open but they knew they’d be donating their gifts to others.  The present we got to keep was a picture of Jesus Christ with a scripture of John 3:16, “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  Kinda cheesy? Haha, I love it!  Then we watched a video about Jesus’s life on earth and focused on the Atonement.  It was a short 5 min, video and that was it!  Short and sweet(It was also neat that a Christmas video our LDS church made for Christmas 2014 couldn’t have fit our Christmas better!  I thought that was really cool).

Then the fun part began, we started delivering the gifts.  I wanted to donate to orphanages but to my dismay, there are no orphanages in UT! So we selected people in our community who were struggling(by word of mouth, we had random people’s input into our selection). I wanted to doorbell ditch so they wouldn’t see what we looked like, but I wanted my kids to experience the happiness that comes from giving and seeing the person’s face light up, so we rang the doorbell, said Merry Christmas, handed them the gifts and left.  We then went to my parents’ house to spend Christmas with our cousins and family.  It was the best Christmas yet.  And I can’t wait to do it again in 4 years, right Jay? 😉

Much thanks to Blendtec for donating a blender, thank you to Solly Baby for donating two baby wraps, thank you to Provo Beach Resort for donating a $15 giftcard, thank you to Blickenstaff’s for donating an Angry Birds game, thank you to Malawaii’s Pizza for donating a $30 giftcard, and Freshly Picked for donating a pair of moccasins.  I hope you know that your donations made someone’s Christmas day.