Christmas is only 58 days away! Are you ready yet?

By: Kristen Paquet, Account Executive, Leonard & Finco Public Relations, Inc.

Holiday visions of a beautifully decorated house, the aroma of cookies baking in the oven and gifts wrapped and placed under the tree are meant to portray the perfect holiday setting. But let’s face it, for many of us, the holidays can quickly become one big ball of stress. Between the shopping, visiting family, parties, wrapping and baking, there is just a lot to do.

So I have decided to create my own holiday tradition: Do as much activity and holiday prep as I can using technology. This will include:

• I’ll get my holiday shopping started while sitting on the couch and visiting my favorite websites. Don’t you just love Cyber Monday?
• No worries about a holiday card this year! I’ll just pick a photo of the kids from one of the many dozens I have stored on my computer (who prints out pictures?) and make my own e-card to send to everyone in my email contact list. 
• My husband is impossible to shop for. Instead of wandering around the mall, I’ll just send out a quick tweet asking anyone following me for suggestions. Or maybe it should be a Facebook poll…
• Kid’s holiday concerts are at two different schools at the same time. Not a problem. My husband and I will divide and conquer. He’ll Skype me in via his cell phone while at my son’s concert and I’ll do the same for my husband while I’m at our daughter’s concert. Multi-tasking at its very best. 
• Cookie baking will be a breeze this year. I’ll just whip up as many cyber-cookies as I can with my new Cookie Maker app. I can “mix” the batter and even decorate my cookies and send them to friends. It’s just as good as the real thing and no calories to count!

Actually, I’m just kidding. I might do a few things using a bit of help from technology, but for the most part, I plan on taking a few photos (which will still probably never get printed) and then plan to put the electronics away to enjoy the time “live and in person.” The holidays may be a crazy time, but can you really picture it any other way? I mean, really… a cyber-cookie?

What I’m wondering, though is if there are any good apps or websites that other people use to help make holiday prep a bit easier. Please share!
Oops… our countdown lost a few minutes… better get started!