What if Christmas wasn't about doing more, but learning how to be more present with your family? In this episode, we're diving into why holiday perfection is stealing your joy and how you can shift from chaos to connection this season.

We're talking about practical ways to focus on what really matters—faith, family, and freedom from the pressure to do everything perfectly. You'll discover how to choose meaningful traditions over Pinterest-perfect moments, and how to prepare your heart during Advent so you can actually enjoy Christmas morning.

In this episode you will learn:

✅Why scrolling social media makes you feel behind and stressed

✅How to shift from perfection to presence during the holidays

✅3 keys to a more peaceful Christmas

✅Simple ways to create meaningful traditions your kids will actually remember

✅How to use Advent to prepare your heart, not just check off a to-do list

Ready to make this your most peaceful Christmas yet?

Grab the Christmas Celebration Bundle mentioned in this episode at HowToHomeschoolmychild.com/Christmasbundle

Show Notes:

Hey everyone, Kerry Beck here with Homeschool Coffee Break, where we help you stop stress so you can take a coffee break. Let me tell you, the topic we're talking about today can stress you out, but I'm here to give you some ideas and some solutions.

Yes, you can see the background, it's one of my first episodes for this Christmas season, and I think it's really important to figure out what happens when you let go of holiday perfection. What if Christmas wasn't about doing more, but being more present?

You know, I used to try to make everything, well, back in the day, magazine perfect. Y'all are dealing with making everything Pinterest perfect, or Instagram perfect. I used to get a magazine, Southern Living. Actually, I got a whole two rows of them, old copies, and Southern Living had always, around November, December, they'd have an article about decorating the tree, and having the perfect little snacks, and everything was just perfect.

Only, anytime I tried that, it didn't work. So, I sort of gave up on it. Some of you may be thinking about, oh, I gotta get the perfect matching pajamas, or just the flawless photos, elaborate crafts. But by Christmas Eve, for myself, and especially Christmas Day after we'd opened gifts, I was exhausted and snappy, and as I've told you before, crying in the car on the freeway.

I realized after a couple years like that, that Jesus never asked for perfection. He asked for presence. He just wants our presence with Him.

How can we let go of that perfection? And you may not be a perfectionist. But you may still be scrolling social media going, oh, I wish I had… oh, look at them, look at that.

That is such a false hope. They are showing you their highlight reels. They are not giving you an accurate picture of what life is like. Because we scroll through Pinterest, Facebook, Instagram, and we feel behind already. We want our kids to have magical memories, but we forget that we set the tone as well.

You see, when we do that, when we are constantly comparing ourselves to other people, we feel guilty. We feel overwhelmed. We feel stressed. And there's one more. Oh, we miss the joy of the season! You know, the season's supposed to be joyful and joy to the world. It is not happening.

Your kids are not going to remember the perfect decorations, or the perfect decorating, tree decorating evening. They're going to remember the times as a family. They're gonna remember your peace and your presence with them. We don't need to be doing more, we just need to be present with our family.

So how can we go from chaos to connection? Letting go of perfection actually opens the door for true connection.

Think about it. What if on Christmas morning, y'all just had a great morning? If you open gifts in, that's great, but you're calm, your kids are happy, the home is at peace. Wouldn't that be awesome?

But it doesn't just happen like this. We need to be intentional about it, and that is why I want to talk to you about that. We can use that time of Advent. Advent starts about 4 weeks before Christmas, and every week we can be doing different activities that can prepare our heart.

Sometimes it's a heart surgery. We need to look at ourselves and see what do we need to do before God? Are there some sins that we need to confess? And we need to model that, and then show our kids as well. And then the different activities need to be purposeful and intentional.

The key here is making a shift to faith, family, and freedom.

Faith. Putting Christ back at the center. Back at the center of your celebration.

Family, focusing on meaningful moments together, not the perfect photo.

And then freedom, releasing the pressure to do everything perfect. And just have joy instead!

You see, we need to spend that time personally, in faith, with our Lord and Savior, spending time, preparing our hearts for that celebration, and then we need to spend time as a family. That will draw the connections first. You've got up and down connection with God, then we have horizontal connection with our family. And when we build those connections, I think we grow into some freedom, that we don't have to do everything perfect.

So, what are some practical ways? I would encourage you to pick one or two meaningful traditions that you might do year after year.

For our family, I think my kids will all tell you their favorite Christmas tradition was baking pumpkin bread and cookies to sell. They took the profit, and they bought a gift for one missionary family. Every year, we picked a different missionary family. And to this day, they've all said something about that. It's one of their favorite traditions.

We did that every year, and they would sell the baked goods, and then we would go to the store and buy it with whatever profit they had, because they had to pay me back for all the ingredients and that type of thing.

So, pick one or two traditions. Say no to the activities that drain your family, that drain your spirit, your husband's spirit, your kid's spirit. Focus on time together, not just checking off the boxes. I did that for several years and realized that was not helping our family.

I think it's really important that we use that time before Christmas, not as a to-do list with a checklist, but to prepare your heart, prepare your heart for that celebration.

Now, it would be nice to have something that's sort of all set out for you, and that's why I did pull together our Christmas Celebration Bundle. I'm going to say this quickly. It's for some of you, it's not for others of you, but it's gonna go back to faith, family, and freedom.

We've got items in this bundle, it's all digital, it's a Christmas celebrations bundle.

Faith. We have a Star of Bethlehem. This really ties together Bible and history and science, all sorts of things, research, writing, and so this is analyzing from Matthew 2 what is the Star of Bethlehem. We have copy work.

We also have fun family activities. This is our Christmas celebration eBook. Celebrate Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany. And for those of you that don't know what Epiphany is, here's a little something. It's the 12 days after Christmas, because the Feast of Epiphany is on January 6th.

That is the day they… we celebrate the wise men arriving. Now, it didn't really happen in 6 days, but that is the day that we celebrate the wise men going to see Jesus. And so there are traditions, activities, all sorts of things in this one book.

And you can see these are for all different ages. We have Christmas around the world. This is more for junior high, elementary, and preschool, and you've got 5 countries that we're gonna, that you can use this as well, with books and crafts and songs and everything. And then we've got Christmas Carol Book, your kids can learn biblical Christmas songs, they can copy it, there's all sorts of things, but that will tie together your faith, your family, and then hopefully give you some freedom, because it's sort of all set out for you. And that is something that can be used year after year after year.

Brooke said she got this bundle, and it helped her save time, and guided her to teach her kids the true meaning of Christmas. Another mom, Elena, told me that she became much more intentional with their learning during the Christmas season. She was excited to dive into Bethlehem Star and learn more about astronomy and astrology.

That is a bundle available. You can go to HowToHomeschoolmychild.com/Christmasbundle, and you can get that there.

You need to think about this. You don't need a perfect plan, you just need a plan, just a simple one that keeps you focused on Jesus Christ.

So let's make this year the year that Christ takes center stage. Christ takes over the heart of you, your kids, and your home.

For unto us is born a child, unto us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders, and he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, and Prince of Peace.

Ready to make this your most peaceful Christmas? Grab the Christmas Celebration Bundle at HowToHomeschoolmychild.com/Christmasbundle!