Christmas Preparation Progress

It doesn't feel like Christmas yet, but my planning for it is coming right along. I thought you might like a recap of what I have done since the beginning of November. 

• Made a gift list (and checked out budget for each)
• Gathered gift ideas from our daughters
• Planned holiday baking, including list of all ingredients
• Scheduled holiday baking 
• Decided to send eCards 
• Addressed, stamped and signed the three physical cards we will mail
• Bought ingredients for first round of baking
• Checked holiday lights, and recycled those that were no longer usable
• Bought one new set of holiday lights
• Checked holiday wrapping for needs (there were none!)

Christmas Cactus. I inherited one when I moved to our new home.
However it isn't blooming, so this picture is the next best thing!

In addition to all those tasks, I also started shopping for gifts. I only have a few so far. I've been doing a lot of my shopping and browsing online in order to find the right item and at the price I'm willing to pay. I also started working on a photo book. And I expect to do more work on the photo book and more shopping in the next week to make a bigger dent in our shopping.

I'm looking forward to baking this week. I'm going to make two loaves of banana bread first since it seems the least holiday related. I make it so many other times of the year, too. I'm also going to make two pans of mint chocolate chip bars. I can get 60 small bars out of each pan. Except for a few bites of the bars, I expect to freeze everything for use later in December. 

I need to take some time to do a little planning for the gifts I will need to mail in December. I'm going to make sure I have the right box, picking up free Flat Rate boxes at the Post Office if necessary. I will be at the post office tomorrow mailing a package, so it will be convenient to pick up what I need then. I also want to make note of mailing dates that are suggested as deadlines. I believe I also need packing tape, so I need to get that on my list. As of now, I only expect to mail two gifts, so very manageable! 

Do you have any progress to report with your Christmas planning? Will you need to mail any packages this year?