I’ve got my Sia Pandora station on. I needed a break from the amazing pipes of the Pentatonix singers on my Christmas station. Pentaholic I am not, but I do appreciate a good acoustic song. And what am I? 16? Seriously, did I just use the term Pentaholic? But… I digress. Time to get down to it.

I wrote the Christmas letter yesterday! Well, the first draft is done. In my erratic moments of sleeplessness last night, I rewrote bits and pieces in my mind. I always second guess what I write about my husband. This is one of those tasks that he trusts me with and contributes absolutely nothing to. I strive to live by the motto to “not say anything about him that I wouldn’t say to him.” Therefore, I write, read, rewrite, and reread over-analyzing absolutely every single word in his designated paragraph.

Layout – I decided to go with the layout granting each family member a paragraph. There is some overlap, but not much. We have four distinct personalities in this house. Each of us has our own interests and hobbies and I try my hardest to make sure everybody gets to try one thing (new or on repeat) each year. So we don’t become a family that only sees each other in passing, there is only one extracurricular activity per child at a time. No wrestling practice after school then hurrying to make sure we hit basketball on Saturday. Not for this family. Mama doesn’t have the energy for that.

Next question – do I write myself in as third person or first? Do I make my high school and college composition teachers smack their heads by mixing up my narrative view? If this confuses you, here is a link to a fairly simple short tutorial on study.com. I am happy to say that I had a thorough education on this topic. I went with first person.

Fair warning to those who receive it… I may or may not have tried to include humor… I’m terrible at humor. That’s why I married my husband. He’s my off-beat joke and constant lighten-up nudging when I’m in a “snarling dog” type of mood. For perspective: Growing up, my younger sister used to do stand-up comedy in our living room. She went to a larger college so she could meet EVERYBODY. I went to a larger college so I could NOT know everybody. Safe to say I never did stand-up routines anywhere.

The delicate balance of the overshare- I tend to lean towards a glass-is-half-full shade of vague. I don’t want to write anything that isn’t true or even lead people to make their own assumptions. The Christmas letter isn’t supposed to be a ‘my life is better than your’s’ situation. On the flip side, I don’t think everybody needs to know the number of times we’ve had the flu, clogged a toilet, or had to apologize. Nobody is pooping rainbows or riding unicorns to school. We are a normal family with hundreds of thousands of little moments over the year that make us happy, sad, angry, and humble.

The goal today is to do the final edit and start printing these puppies out. My sister (the stand-up comic) is actually a professional photographer. She designed and put in the order for our cheesy grins on a magnet that we are distributing to our nearest and dearest. We may just get these done and mailed before 2017. If not, que sera sera! It is, after all, only the annual Christmas letter.