Have yourself a very Lofi Christmas

Your personal guide to Christmas done RIGHT

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Notes:

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Christmas is in the air.

Can you feel it? Can you smell it? It smells like candy cane mayhem. Like crowded carparks, roast potatoes, pine cones, crab sandwiches and fresh rolls of wrapping paper. There’s a certain quality to this month that is hard to describe. It’s manic, it’s exciting, it feels like all the fun you should have been having all year is suddenly meant to be crammed into 30 days, and at a level of intensity that makes you wonder if it even is actually…fun??

I have mixed feelings about Christmas. As a kid I was obsessed with it. I jerry-rigged an advent calendar so that I could start counting down from 100 days, rather than 25. I frenetically made handmade cards, handmade gifts, handmade biscuits and handmade boxes to put it all in. I wrapped presents, I unwrapped them, I wrapped them again. I insisted on chopping down real Christmas trees each year and I decorated them with Michael Bublé crooning gleefully in the background. The whole month felt keyed up, magical, wonderful.

And for the last decade or so I have been trying, fairly unsuccessfully, to recapture that feeling.

Christmas as an adult kind of sucks. I’m sorry to say it, I know that’s not very festive of me. But I know I’m not the only one who feels this way. Don’t get me wrong. I still love it in theory. It’s a time for food, gifts and revelry - all things I technically love. Only when you’re the adult you actually have to cook the food, and buy the gifts, and then by the time you’ve done all that you’ve got no energy left for the revelry.

I’m always left wondering how other people seem to do it so well. Those highly efficient people who bake aspirational gingerbread houses that never collapse, who host large, tastefully decorated family gatherings, give their neighbours gift boxes filled with assorted home baked cookies, and stick wreaths on their front doors. Who are these people?? What is their secret?? Are they snorting no-doz by candlelight and simply eschewing sleep for the month of December? Do they have maids and minions secretly helping them achieve all of these things behind closed doors? Do they have hidden crises, letting off pent-up stress by spitting muffled shouts into wadded bathroom towels right before their guests arrive? I guess I’ll never know.

What I do know, is that I want to find an alternative. A way to enjoy the festive season without making it about buying stuff, fulfilling endless obligations or rushing around in a panic right up until 11pm on December 24th.

And so, a few years ago, I started a Lofi Christmas. Originally it was a Christmas ‘challenge’; an advent-calendar-esque list of wholesome, non-gift-based things to do throughout December to make the month feel a little more special and a little less complicated. I sent an email out to my subscribers every day with one thing to do, in the hopes that I could inspire others - and myself - to find new ways to enjoy the season.

But, to be honest, this year even the idea of a ‘challenge’ feels too…challenging.

All I want for Christmas is a little bit of calm. A touch of beauty. Some nice food. Some quiet evenings. I figure maybe you want the same things I do, so I’m tweaking my Lofi Christmas challenge and bringing you the new improved version from December 1st. I’ve striped it back to the essentials. Simplified it. Made it even more achievable. And I want to share it with you.

If you’re a free subscriber, every Monday through December I’ll be sending out an email with a small-but-significant suggestion to brighten your day.

If you’re a paying subscriber, you’ll get two more emails to see you through the week - one on Wednesday and one on Friday. I hope that these emails will lighten your load, rather than adding to it. The suggestions are easy and small, because often it actually is the small things in life that truly make us happier.

The ideas I’ll share are based around things I love - gardens, nature, food, ritual. Many are inspired by ancient summer festivals thrown by Romans, pagans and other groups of people. Some are mood-boosters, proven by science to make you happier. They are all easy to do. They cost nothing (or almost nothing), and I’m planning to do every single one this December, for a Christmas that feels simpler, less commercial, and happier.

If you’d like to join me and receive every single email, you can upgrade to a paid subscription by clicking the button below.

The first email will go out to paying subscribers on December 1st. I’m excited! I hope you are too! See you soon for… a very Lofi Christmas.

xx Casey

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