Throughout this whole exercise, realize that whole purpose of putting up lights on outside of your house is to celebrate festivities, enrich your family’s enjoyment, and celebrate love of season. If your expectations of putting up Christmas lights detract from that, then it may not be worth doing.

A tradition I grew up with is that every year my parents wrote a family Christmas letter summarizing events of year. Often this was only yearly contact they had with old friends. What a wonderful tradition!

However, several years season got a little too busy. Other events and commitments took priority. Sometimes their annual Christmas letter became a New Year’s or Valentine’s Day letter. (I think I even recall an Easter letter.) That’s okay--I’ve only done Christmas letters perhaps half of years my husband and I have been married. I need to re-evaluate that as a priority, as I certainly enjoy receiving them from others..

A friend let me borrow a wonderful book called Unplug Christmas Machine by Jo Robinson and Jean Coppock Staeheli. It was published in 1982 and I don’t know if it is still in print, but it is a wonderful book with much insight as to how to put love back into season. These two women have conducted many workshops and seminars along this line before writing book. Through their research they discovered that four most important things children really want for Christmas are (no it’s not Game Boy Advance, or Bratz Dolls):

1. Relaxed and loving time with family 2. Realistic expectations about gifts 3. An evenly paced holiday season 4. Strong family traditions

The whole reason we want to give our children gifts at Christmas is to show them that they are loved and wanted. This can sometimes be self-defeating when we stress ourselves with so many expectations that we as parents end up being grouchy and depressed! And we spend so much time trying to accomplish every item on our “to do” list that we even spend less time than normal with our family.

I think that is why family Christmas traditions are so beloved and important. It is family time that can be remembered, counted on and carried on year after year to bring comfort and security.

This year re-examine what Christmas is and what you want it to be to you and your family.

We like to recycle all of those magnet advertisements we get all year by gluing photographs directly to front and cutting around magnet’s shape. This gives you a nice assortment of shapes and sizes and generally looks a little nicer than printable magnet sheets.

Our favorite photo magnet gift is to glue very small printed photos to back of flattened clear glass beads. The glass beads found in craft stores for flower arranging work best and, if you’re lucky, you can even find some that are about an inch across instead of more common half inch size. Glue picture to back of bead, with clear-drying glue, on printed side of your photo. Once it dries, glue a small magnet to back. Small, very strong magnets can also be found at most craft stores. These gifts look especially nice wrapped inside a small tin.

5. Photo Soap: “Consumable” gifts are in this year! Everyone’s house is cluttered and gifts that don’t need a permanent home are well appreciated. Imbed some photos into homemade soaps, and encourage your friends and family to actually use soap, promising more next year. It’s easier than you might think. First, you’ll want to buy some melt and pour soap and some soap molds (plain rectangles or ovals work best.) Cut and laminate some photos so that they are slightly smaller than your soap molds. Melt a small amount of clear soap and pour into bottom (which will end up being top) of a mold. Once it dries, place your laminated photo on top (face down) and pour some more clear soap to cover. If you want, you can add a third, colorful soap layer behind that one, adding a framed look to your photograph.

These are just a few ideas of how to use your photos to make unique Christmas gifts this year. For detailed instructions on these and more ideas, feel free to visit photograph gift page of our website, www.photo-opps.com/photograph-gifts.html.