Being Grateful At Christmas Time

I love Christmas! It’s a time where my family comes together and we celebrate with great amounts of joy, laughter and of course, food. It’s a wonderful season that is full of love.

A couple of weeks later we throw a Christmas party where the house is filled with both our kids and our own friends. It’s a bit crazy in the rush leading up to the event but everyone has a great time with way too much food on offer!

For about the last twenty years the whole family heads into the Myer Music Bowl in Melbourne on the 23rd December for the Carols by Candlelight practice. When we first started going there was about a hundred people camped out on the lawn listening to famous singers rehearse for the big event that is nationally televised the following night. The practice has now grown to around 20,000 people who have a great time with their families singing along to the various carols.

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After the carols Rosleyn and I put together the ginger bread house that was cooked earlier in the day so that it’s ready to decorate the next morning. Since the kids were little they’ve had the joy of decorating the house with candies….I think more go into their mouths then on the house. LOL! Now that Tim’s nearly 23 nothing’s changed other than his girlfriend is pitching in to help out.

Today we head across to my parents for lunch, who live not far away, for a traditional Canadian Christmas meal in honour of the nine years that we spent in that great country. So as well as being Australian I have a fair slice of Canadian in me that makes me want to put some ice skates on and sing “Oh Canada”! The whole wider family will be at my parent’s house so I expect it’s going to be bedlam at present time. All good!

We all roll back home and for dinner for some good wine, fruit, cheese, crackers and a slice of ham. Each year, as a family, we always read the Bible’s account of the first Christmas to help remind ourselves of the true meaning of Christmas. It’s not “happy holidays” but “Merry Christ’s mass”.

After this special family time, we all put our individual sacks around the tree, one for each member and anyone else that is staying with us for Christmas. Each of the kids have had the same uniquely decorated sacks for Christmas since they were born. We all then stuff the sacks full of presents to one another….the rules are that you can’t touch any presents in your own sack until the next morning.

I must admit that I’m like a big kid on Christmas Eve and I get so excited that the next morning I’m the first to get up (around 7am). The first thing I do is make a cup of tea for Roselyn in a cup that is only used on Christmas morning each year. The second thing I do is put on Frank Sinatra singing Jingle Bells and other carols. We only play that on Christmas mornings as well.

Now that they are older I end up waking up the kids for a great time of gift giving, laugher and fun. Afterwards we have a special Christmas breakfast that involves a magnificent parfait made by Tim and then we head off to Roselyn’s parents for Christmas lunch and more presents…..we don’t even want to think about the calories of all these meals!

Boxing day is more family activities, relaxation and this year we may even head down to the beach for some sun…one of the nice things about living in the southern hemisphere is that it’s hot at Christmas.

Amongst all of the frivolity I like to stop and be grateful for all of the blessings that life has brought me. For all of the team at ParkLogic who have put in so much work over the last year, my wonderful wife, children, wider family and friends. For the many friends around the world that I’ve made through the domain industry and the ones that I’m yet to make. I’m going to be particularly blessed this year as Roselyn is coming to NamesCon.

I’m also blessed to have had such great sponsors of Whizzbangsblog this year. Companies such as escrow.com, .club, Karen Bernstein, Namejet, The Domain Conference, Stevan Lieberman and others have made it possible for me to continue to write articles that endeavour to dig out the nuggets of gold that help improve all of our businesses.

I am very fortunate to know so many great people and to be blessed by their friendship. We mustn’t forget that there are also many people that are less fortunate and look on Christmas as a time of sadness as it brings back memories of lost loved ones or other such traumas. If you are one of these then my heart and prayers go out to you.

Lastly, I would like to thank the many readers of whizzbangsblog. Throughout the year you have continued to inspire me to write with your comments, emails and many skypes. I look forward to catching up with many of you at NamesCon and online in the coming year ahead. In the meantime, have a very Merry Christmas and a safe New Year!

Michael Gilmour

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Michael Gilmour has been in business for over 32 years and has both a BSC in Electronics and Computer Science and an MBA. He was the former vice-chairman of the Internet Industry Association in Australia and is in demand as a speaker at Internet conferences the world over. He has also recently published his first science fiction book, Battleframe.

Michael is passionate about working with online entrepreneurs to help them navigate their new ventures around the many pitfalls that all businesses face. Due to demands on his time, Michael may be contacted by clicking here for limited consulting assignments.