Changing my Story: I’m Ready for Christmas

I hear it every year, busy women asking each other, “Are you ready for Christmas?”  The big question is followed by many responses.

Almost.  I haven’t started shopping.  I just have a few more things to do.  I’m not even close.

What is your answer to the question?  I’ve probably given almost all of them over the years, but this year that conversation is bothering me a little.  So I’ve made a decision and I’m changing my story:  I’m ready for Christmas.


My kids are ready for Christmas.  They’re ready for all of it:  Christmas movies, twinkling lights, the first snowfall, Christmas music on the radio, hot chocolate, Christmas stories.  No matter their age, their hearts are open to the magic of Christmas.  My college student has been watching Hallmark Christmas movies since October – that’s how ready she is.


What it really means is that they’re ready for the feeling of Christmas.  Their hearts are open to the beauty of it all.  The lights went up on the house and it was magic for them.  We chose a tree and it was magic again.  They came home from school to find the stockings hung:  magic.  Oh yes, they’re ready.


For me, and for many adults, the question of being ready for Christmas has become a discussion of our to-do lists instead of a state of being.  It’s about our tasks instead of our hearts, because I think it reveals a tendency to act like the holiday is something we provide.  In truth it’s a gift for our taking as much as for our children.


I turned toward November and December with a heart in need of nourishing and a little healing.  There’s no way to overstate the miraculous and generous ways in which my family has been blessed this year, but there are wounds that came before the miracles and they need binding up.  In many ways, I’ve never needed Christmas more, so I’m coming to the stable with a yearning heart.


As I pondered this difference between myself and my kids, I realized it’s my choice.  The bell can still ring for me at Christmas, the magic is mine for the savoring.  I AM NOT THE GIVER OF CHRISTMAS.  It’s a gift from God himself, in the form of his Son.  To quote Jeffrey R. Holland, “But first and forever there was just a little family, without toys or tinsel, with a baby, that’s how Christmas began.”  And that’s where the power of Christmas really comes from.  The lights and the tinsel won’t bind up my heart.  Christ will.


This is why I’m changing my story,  I’m ready for Christmas.  I’m ready for His love, ready to adore Him, most importantly I’m ready to celebrate what He has done for me.  That feeling, that celebration, is free for the taking, regardless of my to-do list.  My new story starts now, because I’m ready for Christmas in the only place that matters, my heart.  Won’t you join me?

Grit in Daily Life

Earlier this year I finally read Angela Duckworth’s book Grit:  The Power of Passion and Perseverance .  I’d been meaning to read it for some time, and I’m so glad I did.  It’s a book I’m still thinking about eight months later.  My goal is to demonstrate grit in daily life.  I’m a better person for having read it.  If you learn one thing from this post, let it be this:

READ THIS BOOK!


What is Grit?

Angela defines grit as “passion and perseverance for long-term goals” and argues that grit is more important in predicting future success than talents or resources.  She’s got research and statistics to back her up and all of it was fascinating to me.  The power of grit helps us achieve our potential and we can grow our grit both from the inside out as well as from the outside in.

One of my favorite passages in the book says:

“We all face limits – not just in talent, but in opportunity.  But more often than we think, our limits are self-imposed.  We try, fail, and conclude we’ve bumped our heads against the ceiling of possibility.  Or maybe after taking just a few steps we change direction.  In either case, we never venture as far as we might have.

To be gritty is to keep putting one foot in front of the other.  To be gritty is to hold fast to an interesting and purposeful goal.  To be gritty is to invest, day after week after year, in challenging practice.  To be gritty is to fall down seven times, and rise eight.”

-Angela Duckworth, GRIT , 275.

How to apply it?

I found myself asking questions like, in what areas of my life do I need more grit?  How can I have more grit as a mother?  What can I do to help my kids be grittier?  What does grit look like in everyday family life?  I’m still asking them, and working to make our family culture one that values and promotes grit.    We’ve always valued practice, hard work, and not quitting in our house.  Our values haven’t changed; I’ve just got a better vocabulary and vision.

It turns out the timing couldn’t have been better.  It’s been a year like no other for my family in both good and hard ways.  A focus on grit has really helped.

Some Things we are Practicing:

It takes grit to learn and teach grit, so we practice all the time.  When I mess up I remind myself that I can develop grit in “parenting with grit”.  Then I take a deep breath and try again.

Talk about grit in daily life

Eric and I decided to be more open with our kids about how we’re practicing grit in our own lives.  Our kids are getting older and we want them to recognize what we’re modeling as adults.

Example 1

My husband spent four months interviewing at various companies for a new job.  The one he was most excited about started off with a timed test to work out a difficult algorithm.  He did not do well on the test, and never heard back from the company.

Example 2

A few weeks later he crashed on his mountain bike and broke his shoulder blade (although they mis-read the x-ray and told him nothing was wrong).  This happened a couple of days before he was flying  to meet executives at another company he had interviewed with.  In pain and moving slower than he realized, he missed his flight!  Embarrassed but determined, he worked out another flight, made the trip a couple of hours later, joked about his mistake, and had a great experience.  When the job offers started coming, this company was first in line, and is the company he now works for.

Example 3

At the beginning of the summer I sprained my ankle badly.  I injured myself on the same day that I had committed to provide 24 gallons of lavender lemonade for a wedding reception.  In spite of my pain I worked to keep my commitment that day (with the help of my son who carried most of it).  I iced my swollen, purple foot and did my best.  It is still swollen and painful 2.5 months later but my kids watched me work hard all summer for my most passionate cause:  our family.  Surely that is grit in daily life!

We spent a lot of time talking about these things, not glossing over the disappointment, pain, embarrassment or stress.  Eric and I didn’t handle our circumstances differently than usual; we just talked a lot more about how we felt and why we kept working.

Eliminate Language that Compares

I have always worked to avoid comparing my children to others, or even to each other.  But I have, on occasion, made the mistake of comparing them to the anonymous “normal” – whatever that is.   In frustration I have said things like “why can’t we clean up after ourselves like normal people?” or any other version of comparing us to some unnamed family or group that does everything right.  It’s wrong. Nobody is normal.

Last night I sat next to my oldest son, who got more of this “why can’t you be more normal” junk than any of my kids.  I sat next to him as he expressed frustration with a principle he was struggling to work through in his mind.  I remembered learning that my family is one of a kind .  I tickled his back and told him that no one else, in the history of the world, has ever been just like him.

Now, every time I hear the word “normal” come up as a comparison I simply say, “Normal’s just a setting on the washer.”  We laugh, talk about what we would like to improve, and discuss ideas.  Then we focus on our efforts, on creating a setting that supports the goal, and showing grit by perservering in the goal.

Give Permission to Fail

Mistakes are part of life.  We say that “mistakes are expected, respected, examined and corrected.
”  Hard work brings both success and failure and the effort is worth noticing.   That effort is what matters.  If applied again, with more understanding, over and over, it will yield great results.  I want my kids to know how proud I am of them for showing grit.

Some of them have started new things.  Before they began I said, “I expect you to mess up and make a lot of mistakes at this.  I don’t expect you to win on your first try.  What I do expect is grit. I expect you to keep trying, to get up and move on, to keep track of your performance and compete against yourself to improve.  That’s all that matters to me.  Have grit and keep getting better.”  I try to reinforce it by asking questions that help them measure their effort by these standards.

Talking about grit and praising effort isn’t always easy, but is a habit worth cultivating.  It doesn’t get any easier with young adults and teenagers, as the failures become more public, have longer lasting consequences, and get more expensive.

Recognize that Grit can mean different things

A tale of two daughters:

One Version of Grit:

Years ago my oldest daughter wanted to play high school soccer.  She played for a competitive club team part of the year, but got cut from the high school team her freshman year.  Disappointed but determined, she went back the next year.  Again, she was cut from the team.  This time it was heartbreaking.  Some girls on the team were terrible to her.

She persevered and went back a third time as a junior.  One day she said, “Mom, no one else is left.  I am the only one doing this, coming back a third time without ever having made the team.”  She made the team.  She had to battle hard her senior year for a spot on Varsity but she did it, and then she played a season of college soccer after high school.  That is grit.  And the grit she developed by believing in herself when no one else did has paid great dividends in her life.


Another Version of Grit:

I have another daughter who also plays soccer who has been gritty in a different way.  Her coach cut her from a soccer team she played with for ten years.  Sadly, it wasn’t about skill or athleticism, but a failing coach/player relationship.  It was brutal and she was devastated.  Everyone heard about it.  She lost friends instantly over it.

When the tears dried a little she sat down and was totally honest about her opportunities and how things might play out with both high school and club teams.  And then she listened to her heart.  What she heard in the storm was a faint pull toward a different sport that interested her, so she bravely pivoted and started training for cross country running.

On her second day her coach heard something he’d never heard from such a new runner, “What do I need to do to get better?”  In her first week she discovered a natural talent, good form, and endurance she didn’t know she had.  Last weekend I watched her line up on the starting line for her first real race and my eyes were misty with tears.  She ran, ran well and hard, and finished strong.  When I met her after the race I asked how she felt and she said, “Great! It was a good first race and I want to get better.”  That is grit.  And I can’t wait to see where it takes her.


Parenting Takes Grit

As I write this, my son asked me to do something for him.  I told him we need to do something else first, and he disagreed.  I feel strongly that we need to do it together so it’s something I’m praying about and working for.   My approach worked on Saturday, but today he walked away from me frustrated and refusing to participate.  I now have three children who are legally adults, and influencing them for good is a whole new world that really challenges me.  In a parenting stage I assumed would be relaxing I find instead that it takes ALL of me.  And I love it.  I love the challenge and am passionate about doing it well.  I guess that means I have grit, too.  I’ll do whatever it takes to figure this out.

That daughter who is now a runner?  She looked at me after a recent conversation about grit and observed, “You really like grit, don’t you?”  I grinned and said, “Yes.  Yes I do.”  We all should, because as Angela says in her book , “if you define genius as working toward excellence, ceaselessly, with every element of your being – then, in fact, my dad is a genius, and so am I,… and if you’re willing, so are you.”

Have you read Angela’s book?  How do you practice grit in daily life, and how are you nurturing it in your family?

Candy Canes and Holiday Goals

It looked like Santa’s workshop.  Wrapping paper, scissors, tape, and stockings littered my kitchen table, complete with the Christmas candy I’d found before most people thought about putting away Halloween decorations.  Everything I’d gathered for weeks sat waiting to be placed in the box.  We were mailing Christmas to Paraguay.



Our daughter is living there as a missionary
for the restored Church of Jesus Christ and this will be her first Christmas away from home.

Five thousand miles away from home.



All my discretionary time had gone to gathering little things I hoped would bring her happiness.   And candy canes.

Little boquets of candy canes, tied with a bow.  More than she would ever eat.  I don’t even know if they already have candy canes in Paraguay, but I doubt it, because American candy of any kind is so hard to find.  What I do know is that she loves the people of Paraguay, especially the children.  Every package I send to her has something little in it for her to give to the children she serves.  In my mind’s eye I could see her smile as she gives them away.  Yes, I had to send candy canes.


We got everything ready and then it got real.  As in, how would we actually fit it all in the box?  I didn’t want to find a bigger box; the flat rate box I had was already going to cost a small fortune to mail.  So we all began suggesting ways to pack everything in, which drew my husband to the table.

I remembered how he fit an unreal number of wedding gifts into our car when we were married and had to haul everything from Colorado to Utah, so I stepped aside and watched him puzzle it out.  He did a great job, fitting more into the box than I would have, although I cringed when one stocking went in upside down.  Soon the box was full and bulging, but he did it.  He got it all in.

I should have been ready for what happened next.

But I wasn’t.

I should have handled it with grace.

But I didn’t.

He squeezed the box so he could seal it.


And I heard candy canes go “crack, crack, crack.”



Somewhere in my brain the thought registered that sealing the box required squeezing it shut.  Somewhere in my brain I knew he had done a logical thing, but apparently that part of my brain wasn’t connected to my heart, and it definitely wasn’t connected to my mouth.  I don’t remember what I said, but I do know that I effectively communicated to my husband that he had messed up and broken the candy canes.  To which he replied, “You didn’t really think the candy canes were going to make it all the way to Paraguay without breaking, did you?  You knew they would break.”

I picked up the package and my keys, and left for the Post Office.  I blinked back tears as I waited in line.  Then I blinked back the tears while I very politely thanked the postal worker for his kind help with mailing my package.  I blinked back tears while I walked to my car.  Then I drove as the tears fell.


I’m her mom.  Moms make holidays happen.  She’s thousands of miles away from home, living in conditions I can only imagine.  I wanted her to open our box and have love come spilling out, not candy cane dust!  I had been so thoughtful about this package, hoping it would feel like Christmas to her, wishing it could hold every tradition and favorite thing about the holiday.  It was my offering to her, my gift of love, and before it even left my house it was broken and flawed.  I felt broken and flawed.

My conscience seared with guilt.  I was crying over candy canes!  Candy canes, of all things.  I’d hurt my husband’s feelings and made him feel flawed as well.  Over candy canes.  Broken candy canes.  In my quest to send the perfect package to our daughter, I’d damaged feelings like my husband had broken candy canes.


Eventually the candy cane dust settled in my heart and I saw the approaching holiday season more clearly.  It’s a lot of work to “do it all”.  The decorations, the events, the food, the gifts, the opportunities for giving, are all amazing and yet challenging.  My husband was doing his part:  making everything fit in the box, and sacrificing a few candy canes was worth it.  He was probably right.  But when we’re all thrown together and life happens, those low-flying but deeply felt expectations can be like my candy canes: fragile.  And when they snap, it’s easy to forget that people’s hearts are a lot like candy canes:  fragile.


Today I am grateful for broken candy canes.  I am sure we will all laugh about how many tiny candy cane pieces ended up inside that box.  I hope I get to share with her what I learned that day.   My goal this holiday season is to remember those candy canes: to let everyone contribute in their own way to our holiday celebrations, to extend grace when something breaks instead of breaking back, and to keep the little things little.  To make relationships and people more important than delivering a perfect holiday. Because all I really want to feel this season is love.  Love is what motivated the package in the first place.  And love is what our daughter will feel when she receives our package, no matter how many tiny, sticky candy cane pieces come with it.

I wish you a heart full of love this holiday season, regardless of what breaks.
-Jennifer

1 4 5 6 7 8 145