I swear I'm not the Grinch. but this year, a small part of me has been dreading Christmas. As a single mom who works part-time [1] from home, my 2-year-old daughter and I are living at my mom's house until I can save enough money to get back on my feet. My job as a work-from-home mom [2] is fulfilling, and I do what I love, but daycare, activities, cable, internet, food, and clothes are pretty expensive — and doing it all on just one salary doesn't leave a lot of money left over for Christmas presents [3].
I might not be able to get her everything on her list this year, but so what? I still have a daughter who is healthy, happy, smart, and funny.
When she was a baby, it wasn't bad. But my now very vocal and very imaginative 2-year-old [5] obviously believes in Santa [6] and already worships the ground he walks on. You better believe she's made her Christmas list known to me. And I can guarantee you, she's checked it way more than twice. "Maybe Santa will get it for me," she always suggests with a little hopeful smile when we pass a toy in Target.
After crunching the numbers, I knew my daughter wouldn't be getting a plentiful pile of presents [7] under the tree this year. Maybe one or two at most. As my bank account dwindled, so did my dreams of giving my daughter the full Christmas experience. At first, I panicked. Then I worried. I got sucked into the black abyss that is mom guilt [8] and furiously searched the internet for the best upcoming deals. Then I crunched the numbers again.
When my pity party was over, I started thinking of all the things I still had to be happy about. I might not be able to get her everything on her list this year, but so what? I still have a daughter who is healthy, happy, smart, and funny [9]. I still have a roof over my head and food to eat. I still get to spend Christmas with my family.
I started to replace her Christmas list of toys with fun Christmas activities [11] and experiences we can do together instead. Building snowmen, taking sleigh rides, making paper snowflakes, drinking hot chocolate, baking cookies, watching Christmas movies, singing Christmas songs, decorating the tree . . . the list goes on and on. And most of them don't cost anything but a little one-on-one time and love.
I hope my daughter will always love making memories like this with me during Christmas and won't feel disappointed. I know it's been my favorite gift so far.