Welcome to the awesome marriage podcast, a place for honest conversations about marriage and how to have the relationship that God has designed for you. I am your co-host, Christina Dodson. On the show will be our host, Dr. Kim Kimberling and Nill Smith. To engage with the awesome marriage podcast, use the hashtag awesome marriage. The holidays can be so stressful for a number

of reasons. So that's why we're doing this series on six tips for surviving the holidays.

In this episode, we're going to be talking about another tip to survive the holidays, which is

to invest in memories and not materials. So Dr. Kim, why should we invest in memories over materials?

Probably the first thing would be that memories last. You know, the materials, the other things

that we can get so caught up in the Christmas season are not, most of them aren't going to last

or they're not going to, you know, they're going to fade away. But the memories, you know, and I think,

you know, even all of us who are. But the memories, you know, and I think, you know,

even all of us who are adults now, no matter what age you're at, you look at back and Christmas

in the past, yeah, I can probably maybe remember one gift I got all the way growing up because it was

a bicycle, you know, and that was always the big deal. But other than that, it's the memories. It's family being together.

It's going to church together.

It's those kind of things that you remember.

And I think it's so our culture, just because of what it is, I mean, people make things

they want us to buy and they advertise them.

And I get that.

And so that's okay.

But those things are all not going to last. And so I think it's putting things of perspective and really being intentional about creating memories that are going to last that are going to be something to be special to everyone that's around you and around your family at Christmas for years and years and years.

Yeah, I totally agree. I think I think most people would agree with that. That when you look back on your favorite Christmases, it's never like, oh, this is my favorite Christmas because I got this present. It's always my favorite Christmas because this is what happened and this is what we did. And these were the memories that we created. And so it really is, it's the thing that lasts and the things that matter and the things that we're really going to care about in the future. Absolutely. Yeah, I'm just thinking, even if you get engaged on Christmas, you're,

you know, you got the ring, but you're going to remember when it happened and how it happened

and what happened and the family celebrate with you. And those are the things that you're going to

remember. Yeah, that's so true. That's a really good picture and a really good example because you're right. It's not like, oh, I got this ring on that day.

...