Dear overly-zealous holiday aficionado: You’re ruining everything.
Sure, you pick out gifts with the jaw-dropping thoughtfulness of Leslie Knope, and you know the lyrics to 738 popular and unpopular holiday songs — but your perky fervor for the holiday season tends to ruin the surprise of gift-giving. You just can’t keep a secret. It’s time to make a game plan for your big, excitable mouth and mound of gifts.
Spread out the fun
If the tundra of time between Black Friday and Christmas Day is just too much time to keep a secret, spread out the fun. Celebrate St. Nicholas Day on Dec. 6th, or give your loved ones a small gift for the week leading up to the big day. That should relieve some of your internal pressure.
Blab with a pack of lies
By now, your loved ones expect you to blow the secret — so let them believe that you have. Just feed them a pack of lies and “give away your secrets” a thousand times over with terrible misinformation. Blabbing about the fake goods will feel so good to your soul.
Turn into a last-minute shopper
Still can’t trust yourself? Or can’t trust your loved ones to stay out of the closet o’ gifts? Turn into a last-minute shopper if you don’t believe you can keep a secret from your family. The adrenaline rush of last-minute shopping easily equals the buildup of expectation.
Wrap immediately
Pay a little extra for gift wrapping upon purchase. Not only will gift wrap disguise your presents from curious snoopers, it’s quite likely that your mommy brain will forget what you even purchased in the first place. Safe from snoopers, and safe from yourself.
Pay with cash or PayPal
Plagued by a gift recipient who has access to your online banking? Don’t let an Amazon line item of, “One Banana Hammock, $35,” ruin your surprise. Pay with cash or a private PayPal account to prevent your bank from destroying the holidays.
Invest your energy in a fabulous riddle
Instead of investing all your energy in the gifts, turn your thoughts towards a secretive riddle. For instance, make your kids use the holiday season to solve the riddle of which gift wrap holds their presents. You can give additional clues every week in December to help them solve it by Christmas morning. With your focus on the riddle instead of the gifts, you’ll be able to keep a secret.
Turn into an office over-sharer
Take your gift-giving news to the office and blab about your gifts to all those colleagues who won’t receive any from your treasure trove. Your secret is probably safe with Larry from Accounting.
Now, go turn on A Charlie Brown Christmas and pour some egg nog. We know you want to.
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