This year we don’t have an advent calendar. We’ve had an advent calendar of some description for the last nine years and I decided I’m not doing it anymore.

The first advent calendar we did with the sensory advent calendar.  I worked out lots of wonderful sensory experiences themed around Christmas I had a big bag of goodies for us to explore every day…

 …we did not explore them every day there wasn’t time.

 I’ve also tried a core word advent calendar where each day I would sure Lucy a new word on her AAC device…

 …we did not explore a new word every day because there wasn’t time.

 more recently how do you sided to try advent calendar is with toys in them we’ve had Playmobil and Lego…

… we ended up opening lots and lots of doors at a time because every day, guess what,  there wasn’t time.

The thing is Lucy’s not bothered about an advent calendar. I don’t think she really understands what an advent calendar is and although she is more than happy to share a toy an activity or experience with us she is in no way missing out on Christmas because we’re not providing a surprise every day. She doesn’t wake up excited about what she’ll find today, like I used to. I was a child of the 80s too- I only got a new picture to look at each day!

I don’t regret the sensory, core word and toy advent calendars. In fact I rather enjoy what, I admit, is  my Christmas Playmobil set and not Lucy’s at all (as you can see from the picture, she just doesn’t play nicely with it!). Each year we gave it a go, we explored what might work and tried to make the expected tradition fit for us, but it didn’t. 

So this year we are letting go of this particular tradition. As we approach out 10th Christmas with Lucy I’ve learned more about Lucy and our family, thought more about what matters to us all and I know I don’t need a sensory advent calendar to have a good Christmas.

This  decision doesn’t come easy. It means realising year-on-year saying that this isn’t the year that suddenly an advent calendar becomes a big deal for Lucy, it’s not the year she embraces and understands all the traditions and rituals of Christmas. At a time when her peers are growing older and asking questions it’s another bit of evidence of the differences between her and other 10 year olds.

The thing is though, what Lucy thrives on and what she really wants is to have fun with her friends and family and spend time with the people that she loves.

In that respect she might be the wisest person I know when it comes to decisions about what really matters when things get busy and whether we really need to stress about providing a sensory advent calendar.