I was blog surfing tonight and found a great tip from Courtney over at aisforbeautiful.com. On her list of “100 things about me,” number 49 struck me as an idea all families can adapt into their lives to gain more time together.

49. My family and I have a goal to go hiking every time there is a fifth Sunday.

What a great way to decide to do something special together, every time there is a fifth Sunday. Make it a family day. Maybe it’s a special dinner, or a day at the park, the zoo, a day to visit grandma. Maybe it’s a day to volunteer, or maybe it’s just family lazy day.

This year there are 4 fifth Sundays:

• March 31
• June 29
• August 31
• November 30

How will you spend them?

December is such a stressful month. I’ve been writing about how much I have to do with Christmas creeping up on me. Today, while pulling out of the Einstein Bagels store parking lot a woman in a mini-van waved me into traffic. It was a simple, but great gesture that really put me in the right frame of mind for the day. You see, I was already running late, having run out of the house without eating anything when I decided I needed nourishment for the long day ahead of me. So, stopping for a bagel meant I was pushing the envelope even more. When this woman waved me in it gave me some time back. Here are some ideas of things we can do for each other this month:

1. Let a car in front of you.
2. Let someone with only one item go ahead of you in line at a checkout counter
3. Put money in the Salvation Army kettle. Those bell ringers work for long hours, often in the cold. Put something in.
4. Skip the parking spot nearest the store — let someone else park there.
5. Put your neighbor’s newspaper by his front door one morning.
6. Pay the toll for the car that is behind you.
7. Offer to return the shopping cart to the store for someone who just put groceries in his car.

Last week my son’s daycare had their annual Christmas party. He had to bring a gift to exchange with a boy from his class and I was told to buy something that my son would want because “sometimes the two-year-olds don’t like to share the gift they brought.”

My son has been doing OK in this area — participating in a weekly “bring your toy to share” day has helped, but I wondered if he would have a meltdown when asked to give away the present he carried through the front door. He did well and came home with a different gift than the one he brought.

Giving is such a key component to Christmas that I want to teach it early on. I did a couple of searches for toddlers and givng, but found mostly teaching toddlers how to share. While sharing is probably the first step to giving, I want to find ways to teach about giving at this time of year.

Related:

• Helping toddlers learn about sharing at Christmas
• Teaching your child to be generous, not greedy

“Twenty Days Until Christmas,” — this is a headline I saw on a Web site this morning while I was looking for Christmas cookie recipes. Twenty days. I haven’t even made my shopping list, although I have made several purchases already. Usually I have goals of when to get all my out of state shopping done: The first people I shop for are those to whom I have to mail something. I have most of these done, but need to wrap, box and ship them. I’ve still got some time:

According to the United States Postal Service here is the mailing calendar:

Letters and cards — Dec. 20
Priority Mail — Dec. 20
Express mail — Dec. 22
Parcel post — Dec. 15

If you are shopping online, this year’s drop-dead shipping date is December 19 (15 days from today).

Not only do I need to do my shopping, I have to purchase the Christmas cards (address and mail them), take my son to see Santa, get our tree, decorate the tree, and so on. I thought I was ahead of the game, but that headline this morning makes me realize that I need to get going!

Today I went with a few moms and our kids to a local nursing home to visit with the people who live there. We thought it would be nice for them to see the kids all dressed up in their Halloween costumes. Boy, did I underestimate the welcome we would receive.

We planned on handing out some goodie bags to them, kind of like a reverse trick-or-treat. We did not anticipate the kids trick-or-treating around the facility; the employees hadn’t planned for it either — but it’s exactly what we ended up doing. An employee pulled out a big bag of candy (I suspect to be used at the resident Halloween party they had planned for later in the day) — before I knew it, they had distributed the candy to residents so that they could hand our kids the candy.

Up and down the halls we went. There weren’t even that many of us; 4 moms and 6 kids, but it seemed like an army. I could feel the warmth and see the welcome in their smiles. We even made some residents smile, that apparently “never smile.” That’s the power of a toddler for you. It’s the power of giving. Today we gave time.

We were repeatedly thanked by so many people there, but we are the ones to be thankful — for the experience of putting smiles on so many faces today.