Prepare Ahead to Ensure A Happy Christmas

Preparing for the Christmas season at the last minute may cause unnecessary chaos while planning ahead can save your time, money and energy. In order to avoid forgetting things and make it easy to check, you should make lists for jobs to do, presents to buy, friends to visit and food to prepare. 

The following tips might help you enjoy the holiday season. 

1. Financial Plan 

How to economically & efficiently use money is always the top concern for people during the festive season.

Shop Online:  The gorgeous window showcase and big Christmas sales are so attractive that sometimes you just can’t stop yourself buying things that you don’t really need. It would be super exciting on the moment you get the beautiful package bag from the smiling sales lady. But will you still be exciting when receiving credit card bill two weeks later?  The answer is definitely “NO” to many people. So, make a list, take a few hours to shop online and close browser immediately once you get all what you need. Staying away from temptation could be an effective way to save money. In addition, shopping online can avoid stress & crowds in a busy street or mall. 

Pay Ahead: Before heading for vacation, make sure that all your bills which due on holiday have been paid in advance. The bill list may include electricity, insurance, house rent, just to name a few. 

2. Family Plan 

Christmas is the ideal time for family fun no matter it is a trip, a party or just a visit. 

Trip: Double check your air flight or train timetable, call the hotel to confirm your reservation, sharing a packing list to take all necessary luggage. Oh, yes, passport or ID card is the one that you should never leave behind. 

Visit: Make appointment in advance and set reminder so that you won’t be late or even forget. Also, remember to pick up a sweet present. 

Party: Hosting a party is never easy. There are lots of to-do items such as venue decoration, things to buy, send invitation. It would be sensible to assign some tasks to others to avoid being exhausted. 

3. Work Plan

Isn’t it disappointing to talk about work during Christmas Break? Unfortunately, the truth is not everyone is lucky enough to totally put work aside during holiday. If you are the not so lucky guy, don’t get upset first. You can still make a balance with the help of TickTick. 

1) List all work-related stuffs & prioritize them 

2) Ignore tasks of low priority as they could be done when you back to work 

3) Set recurring tasks like checking email: take 15 minutes every night before sleep and if an email contains a follow-up action, turn it into a to-do item in TickTick and reschedule a time to complete it. 

4) Use “Tags” to set context for different tasks such as #phone call so that you can make use of your segment time to do it without sitting down before desk with a feeling of working. 

Finish reading? Now, slap your back to give yourself some encouragement. You’ve gone through another busy year and it’s time to enjoy your holiday and being more productive in the coming 2015! 

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