I missed Small Business Saturday this year because I spent Thanksgiving in Montreal celebrating my oldest kid’s graduation from McGill. The fourth Thursday in November is not a holiday in Canada, but I was thankful just the same, watching him cross the stage in the Place des Arts to receive the degrees he worked so hard to earn.
Proud mama moment … ahem…
Lest I digress further, instead of shopping small on Saturday, I was recovering from traveling all day Friday across Eastern Quebec and northern Vermont and New Hampshire in the rain.
Fortunately, shopping local is not a once-a-year occasion like Black Friday or Cyber Monday. You can do it every day. Dollars spent at local businesses pay bills and put food on the tables of people who live alongside you as neighbors, schoolmates, friends, and acquaintances. Most local businesses also support the community with sponsorships, donations, and other support beyond the provisions they sell.
I always commit a good portion of my Christmas budget to small local businesses for all the shop-local reasons I just shared. Also because I like to give one-of-a-kind items you just won’t find at the mall or big box stores.
“Gifts” I learned many years ago is my “love language,” so the carefully chosen ones I find at little shops carry messages from my heart. You’d think a writer and editor would be good with words. But I find the right knick-knack, throw pillow, or kitchen gadget says it all.
This year I plan to do much of my local Christmas shopping right here in Lincoln County, especially for my “stocking sister,” Donna Leonard, who lives in Boothbay.
We met when we both worked at Hyde School in Bath long ago when we first became mothers. We are not related, despite our last names, but since 2016, we’ve exchanged Christmas stockings.
Donna, like me, is motherless. It’s not like we are orphaned little kids or anything, but both our mothers died too young, leaving us to figure out how to be mothers ourselves on our own.
We “got to talking” as they say, about how our moms were amazing gift givers, and their stockings were the best, and how much we missed that special mother’s touch on Christmas morning, as we fulfilled that role for our own families.
It didn’t take long for us to say, “Hey, wanna swap stockings?”
I look forward to a lot at Christmas. After all, I speak “gifts.” The ritual Donna and I created might be my favorite. We both try to “channel” each other’s mom as we pick out little presents, bake signature treats, and in my case, stitch up an annual craft. We always include an ornament, chocolate, and something with a bit of a kick to drink.
I know I will find everything I need to make Donna’s stocking extra special at the shops and farms and craft fairs of Lincoln County.
In the interest of total transparency, I did some shopping whilst in Montreal, mostly for Canadian candy bars the kids love.
But there’s a can of St. Hubert’s Poutine Gravy headed for Donna’s stocking. Maybe a Cherry Blossom and Coffee Crisp, too.
