Christmas used to be a tough task master for me. With many people to buy for, my own five kids, extended family, and never enough money, I would endeavor to make many of the gifts that I sent. There was a lot of baking and meticulous wrapping in an effort to dress up my meager offerings.

As I worked into the night, I often had the feeling that whatever it was I was making would be relegated to the back of someone's closet, but in Hubby's family you couldn't NOT give a gift. I had to do what I could afford, which was to attempt to make something out of nothing year after year. Though I felt that gifts ought to be personal, I was more than a little envious of people who could simply write a check and stick it in a card.

Though I had always LOVED all the traditions of Christmas as a child, being an adult, especially the mom, had whittled away at my joy in it. At the end of the season, I'd find myself completely depleted, usually sleep deprived and exhausted beyond any hope of revelry.

As the kids got older it became a little easier as there was no pretense of Santa. We drew names and shared in the shopping responsibilities. However, the complications of drug addictions had marred many a Christmas day, and I had to let go of whatever ideals I still harbored in my heart of what this day was supposed to be like.

Happily, this will be the first year where I can guiltlessly pass the baton in the gift giving department as each of my adult children have their own households. I, too, am graduating. My checkbook is out and ready to give the kids what they need most, money, and me a somewhat reluctant but satisfactory compromise... simplicity.

I've let my adult kids know that we will not be braving sleet and snow and windy roads in order to be with them this year. We will stay home and enjoy a quiet Christmas here. It will be a different experience for all of us, and I know some are disappointed. Oh well. I couldn't keep doing what I was doing. I am at peace about it.