Holiday stress happens when you wait until the eleventh hour to decorate, shop, ship and bake. Don't.

Marni’s Holiday Checklist

If you’re like me, and don’t want another season of overspending, overachieving, overeating, and generally overdoing, and if you want a great holiday season, minus the stress, guilt, migraines and exhaustion, I have some advice. I looked back at past years for what I’ve done wrong and right. I made a list and checked it twice, and have this holiday plan for a beautiful, enjoyable, and almost-stress-free season. The secret is to start early, pace yourself, and take shortcuts. The holiday countdown begins Thanksgiving weekend. You have four weeks until Christmas.

On your mark, get set ….!

WEEK ONE

Decorate: Put up your tree and other holiday decorations, including lights if that’s part of your program.

Simplicity Tip: Don’t spread your decorations all over the house. Instead, go all out in a few spots, like the entryway, mantels and hearths, the banister, the powder room, and the dining room table. This makes decorating and undecorating easier.

WEEK TWO

Send Cards: Get the family photo (if you’re doing one, and get your holiday cards – imprinted. Gather your address list, forget the letter, really, and send out your greetings.

Simplicity Tip: I’ve used www.shutterfly.com for my holiday cards. The company offers a nice variety of card styles, is fast, reasonable, and lets you create your photo card online.

Simplicity Tip: Long ago I gave up hand addressing envelopes. It’s really okay to print your envelopes using your computer printer, or to use pre-printed labels. Just use a festive script font and ink in a holiday color. 

WEEK THREE

Shop, Wrap & Ship: Create your gift list. Remember everyone you forgot last year. Consider teachers, special neighbors, dog groomers, hairdressers, housekeepers, the bus driver and the newspaper carrier. Once your list is complete, create a per-gift budget, then shop all at once online as much as possible. Try to limit outings to retail stores to one or two power trips. Because wrapping always takes longer than you think, accept stores offers to wrap for you. Ship everything that needs to be sent this week to avoid expedited shipping fees, because they hurt.

Simplicity Tip: Order as many gifts as possible online, you’ll save time, gas, and avoid impulse buys at the mall. If you need to send your present, have the company do it for you. Many will wrap and include a gift card for a small additional fee.

Simplicity tip: Speed wrap by using gift bags. They’re faster than wrapping boxes, and are reusable. Get a bunch of solid color bags in assorted sizes. (Stick with two colors that match your tree decorations, so packages coordinate.) Embellish bags with festive wire-ribbon bows.

WEEK FOUR

Party and Bake: Now that most of the work is behind you, enjoy the pre-holiday week. When people ask, “Are you ready for the holidays?” You can honestly say, “Yes.” Attend parties, food shop, bake, see the Nutcracker, attend church, enjoy the lights.

WEEK FIVE

Cruise: Decompress and enjoy the downtime the week between Christmas and New Year’s.

Simplicity tip: I like to use this week to clean closets and make a charity donation. It’s feels good to give to others, and you start the New Year clean and de-cluttered.

WEEK SIX

Undecorate: Take down decorations, and put the holidays away. And take your house back.

Simplicity Tip: Buy red and green plastic bins (available at Wal-Mart) and store all holiday decorations in them. Finding them in the garage or rafters will be much easier.

Simplicity Tip: Though it’s hard to even think about going through this again, make the next year go smoothly by packing things away using the LIFO method of inventory. The only thing I remembered from my accounting class, it stands for Last In First Out. In other words, put the items you put up first away last, so they are the first boxes you open when you start decorating next year.

When I was in kindergarten, I used to get in trouble for talking in class. I attended a private Christian school, and the teacher would put masking tape over my mouth. They could get away with that in those days.

One day, my fed up teacher sent me to the principal’s office. My mom was also called to the office to discuss “my problem.”

“Why do you talk so much in class?” the principal asked me.

My mother has never let me live down my earnest reply: “I just have so many important things to say.” Though my mother thought that was a major crack up, I meant it. I still feel that way.

Whether or not anyone else thinks what I have to say is important isn’t the point. I feel compelled to say it. Which is why this week was so frustrating. I sent my next book, House of Havoc: How to Make – and Keep – a Beautiful Home Despite Cheap Spouses, Messy Kids and Other Difficult Roommates off to press. And I had to shut up. I read the final proofs, squirted in the last bits of copy and sent it to the editors, who put it to bed, as they say. Then I wrote this week’s column, which SHOULD BE IN THE BOOK. I had one more thing to say!

The column, which will appear in papers in a couple weeks, is on what to do with all those ribbons, medals and trophies kids accumulate faster than Facebook friends. Now, my kids aren’t exactly superstar athletes, but you wouldn’t know that by looking at the wall full of ribbons they’ve collected from horse shows and gymnastics meets. At the average gymnastics meet, a kid brings home five ribbons: one for each of four events, and one overall — even if the kid fell off the equipment twelve times. That’s because we’re building self esteem!  My oldest daughter recently got a ribbon for 1oth place in a horse show. Tenth! Out of 15 riders. But, hey, we’re building self esteem! We don’t tape mouths. We give trophies: “Most Talkative!”

The problem with these awards, apart from building a false sense of accomplishment, is that, be honest, they’re ugly and create clutter. But we parents have to not only save them but also display them or be reported to Child Protective Services. We’re building self esteem!

Anyway, my point, and yes there is one, is that I wrote my column this week on attractive ways to capture and feature these victories, hollow or otherwise. And as I wrote, I kept thinking: This belongs in my book, but it isn’t there. Though I’d already written the last word, I still had one more important thing to say. And I always will. It’s the story of my life.