Christmas Boys
The following post is in answer to a question posted over at The Non-Consumer Advocate Facebook group from Donna who asked about “Getting extended family on board for a non-consumer Christmas?”
The calendar may say October 3rd, but for many Americans, the Christmas season is already starting to ramp up. The lead-up to Christmas, rife with incessant elevator music-style carols, family pressures and animatronic swiveling-hipped Santas make me hate Christmas. Big time. However, I don’t want to pass this attitude along to my sons.
I guess a little background is in order. I am Jewish, but my mother isn’t and we always had a Christmas tree and visits from Santa Clause when I was growing up. My husband is not religious in any way, although his parents grew up going to church. Having neither Jesus nor consumerism in my life, Christmas is more a stressful chore than anything else. We do not exchange Chanukah gifts.
For many people, the pressure to participate in expensive gift giving or to happily receive cluttery unwanted gifts can be an annual burden.
So . . . should you just grit your teeth and smile through a season of giving up on your frugal and simple living goals?
No.
Now is the time to start those conversations with family members. Talk to your parents, your siblings, your spouse. That well meaning friend who overwhelms you with expensive gifts. But here’s the key, don’t simply suggest an abrupt stop to gift giving. You might try suggesting a replacement of your normal gift giving tradition with something else. Some families have tried the “handmade gifts only” route, or only giving to kids or simply drawing names.
For my family, the ramping down of Christmas gift giving was a series of conversations. My father and step-mother were very happy to stop exchanging gifts and to just give to the grandkids, as were my sister and brother-in-law. However, my mother and step-father were horrified at the notion, so we do still exchange adult gifts with them. My in-laws wanted no part in a stop of buying gifts for their adult children. So . . some progress.
The way that I keep Christmas under control is to stick with my normal shopping habits, even when it’s for gift giving. I still shop at thrift stores, look for cheap deals online, (like theater tickets) and I allow myself to be less than perfect. My husband and I differ on this, and we end up conflicted on how to provide a positive Christmas experience for the kids without dropping hundreds of dollars. He already knows that I will return pretty much any and all expensive gifts that I receive. (One year he bought me my own copy of The Complete Tightwad Gazette and a $150 purse. Guess which one went back to the store?)
I guess I don’t really have a definitive answer on how to put a Non-Consumer Christmas together.
Has your family found ways to usher Non-Consumerism into your traditions? Please share your ideas in the comments section below.
Katy Wolk-Stanley
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without”
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As for gift giving, I’m kind of haphazard about it. We are a big and complicated family, and we tend to give gifts to the kids but no one is particularly bent out of shape if one of the uncles doesn’t send a gift. Adults — we exchange presents more along the lines of “I just knew you would want this” and only if something presents itself. No gift giving is ever required or expected. And it’s not always on a holiday, either. If I see or think of something that is perfect for a loved one, I will give it to them, regardless of the date.
A couple of years ago one of my sisters-in-law gave me a crock-pot cookbook that she had on her shelf. She said she had heard me say I wanted one like it, so she made copies of the few recipes that she used from the book and then wrapped and gave it to me. I was delighted! I still use it, and I love it.
Several years ago, my sister-in-law made and froze a dozen meals, side dishes and desserts and gave them to me as a Christmas present. It was, beyond doubt, the most thoughtful gift I’ve ever received.
That is an awesome gift! I am deeply envious.
Katy
I can’t imagine Christmas without Jesus. He is the reason for the season we so often hear. But more than that, I can’t imagine my life without Him in it on a daily basis. I pray that this holiday season you may search to see how Jesus could bring so much for into your life if He were included. He loves you and gave His life for you all you have to do is accept Him and your life can be changed forever and you can have eternal life.
It sounds like being Christian is very important and meaningful for you. However, I am Jewish.
Please respect that.
Katy
It is interesting that biblical scholars agree that Jesus was actually born in October, not on December 25. And, Christmas as a holiday has pagan origins.
Personally, Christmas is no big deal for me. My father is a non-practicing Catholic, and my mother became a Jehovah’s Witness (from Episcopalian) when I was little, so I never really had Christmas. (Relatives weren’t hugely into it and for the most part respected my mother’s wishes not to give us gifts.) If you’ve never had it, it’s completely and utterly meaningless to you, and it’s no big deal not to celebrate it. As an adult (and not a Jehovah’s Witness myself) I, like another poster, and “haphazard” about gift-giving. My husband’s family, as a rule, only gives gifts to the kids. But the nieces and nephews have no many aunts and uncles that they get a million gifts… and no one really notices if someone forgets to give something one year. My husband and I sometimes exchange gifts, sometimes not. We don’t usually do a tree, and if we do exchange gifts, they’re usually small. Sometimes we’ll just travel instead. As much as I felt “different” from other kids growing up, as an adult it feels hugely freeing to not have the burden so many other people have.
That said… when an older woman with whom I volunteer asked me how my Easter (another overly commercial holiday) was, and I said I didn’t celebrate Easter, she told me (knowing nothing about me) that clearly I had never had any problems in life, but that when I did, I would find Jesus. She said she would pray for me that I would find Jesus, and “not go to hell”!!! I told her thanks, that’s okay (and quite frankly though I have no religion, I believe that if there is a God, it is not Jesus… Jesus would at most be God’s son (if not just a man.) She wouldn’t let up. Please, respect other people’s religions, or lack thereof!
I always got stressed out over Christmas shopping for extended family. (I have two children and have always limited their gifts to three each.) Last year however, I gave each of my siblings’ families a tabletop pizza oven. This year I will give each family an ice cream maker. I gave my father a bottle of vodka and my mother a plant from the nursrey (we live in Florida). That reduced stress and spending for me, plus the waste of more broken, unwanted toys hitting the landfills.
I have a huge garden and most of my friends and relatives do not. So, I spend the year scouting out nice large baskets at garage sales, and in September I give baskets of vegetables and a few jars of homemade jams or relishes. I have found that people like getting the food and like that it is not arriving when all the other Christmas stuff is…It also saves me money and I really, really enjoy thinking about each person as I put in potatoes, pumpkins and peas and so on in each basket. It is sort of like praying for them for those few minutes I am focused on them.
As for what people give us, I ask for high quality toilet paper and my favorite kleenex. It took a while, but after a few years I pretty much have everyone trained. They think it is a hoot and I am always very effusive and reiterate how much money this saves us over the year—and that I would only buy the cheapest stuff, so it is a luxury to get soft toilet paper. And if someone gives me something really over the top, I thank them and either use it or pass it on. I feel like part of kindness is not making people feel awkward or insisting that they adhere to my version of Christmas—they can do it their way and I do it mine. Sometimes my gift to them is that I don’t get all cranky because they don’t chose to live the way we do; I want to be polite about this, but a lot of folks who commented on this topic sound very righteous and mean-spirited—Christmas is their way or the highway. If you don’t like or want a gift, then honor the person who made the effort and pass it on.
My husband always makes my gift, as he is a skilled carpenter. I buy him presents but I don’t go overboard. And we spend Christmas day going to a movie (which we seldom do because of the prices!).
Well Said.
For our family, Christmas is all about the birth of Jesus and celebrating that and honoring his life. We will save a special offering…kids and adults, it’s a family thing…to be donated to a charity our church sponsors. This is something aside from our usual giving, and we will make a point of learning as much as we can about the charity and the people they are helping. To us, that is what it’s about, not elaborate decorations and gifts, not focusing on ourselves, but the needs of others.
We bake cookies or other treats for our neighbors and co-workers. Then we focus our celebrating on doing activities together and being with family and friends, and celebrating Jesus…the local Christmas parade, a concert, an interactive nativity drama, zoolights, a night drive to look at lights, making gingerbread houses….we usually don’t have enough time to do everything we think of! We give minimal, if any, gifts to adults, and everyone is quite happy with this. For the kids we give a couple of gifts that are of good quality and will last for a long time vs lots of cheap, soon to be broken toys.
It’s been a slow process over the past few years to turn our holidays away from the gift giving so much as our time together. We start about 3 years ago – first we just drew names and only bought for one person.
Last year my husband and I didn’t give gifts at all but instead “acts of service” – for our mom’s we gave them flowers each month (we got creative – potted forced bulbs, garden grown sunflowers), for our siblings we baked them one treat each month. It definitely took the pressure off the holidays!
This year we are not exchanging gifts at all and instead are pooling our resources to rent a cabin together as a family next summer. My mother was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer in the Spring and it really drove home to my family that gifts are not important – our time together is what we really value.
Even in the “flush” years, we have never given expensive gifts for Christmas. Our kids friends get i-pods, i-phones, Playstations, etc. but we have never done that. If our kids want those things they can buy them, and they usually get some money from us and some from their grandfather.
We have had several years when my husband didn’t have work for a couple of months around Christmas and we told the kids in advance that they would get some things in their stockings, and nothing else. No matter what age they were, they were fine with that. We still decorated a tree and had a feast on Christmas. My husband’s father spends Christmas with us, and we emphasize the time together. He often takes us all to a movie (a movie in the theater is a rare treat!) while he is with us.
We stopped the aunts, uncles, and cousins giving gifts years ago. My husband and I don’t live near any of them and we didn’t know them well enough to give or get a meaningful gift anyway! And we told them we would rather have a family picture and a letter catching us up. We have often done that (can’t even afford THAT anymore) and but they never did. We made up for it with phone calls on Christmas Day.
Now, I confess that I LOVE to give and receive presents, so this is not what I want to do. But I refuse to go into debt to finance Christmas!
Over the years we have made Christmas into an OUTDOOR celebration. We live in Arizona. Most of our relatives live far away and we never did have a family gift giving routine, except I send My Dad and step Mom a food gift from Harry and David which they LOVE. My in laws were never gift givers, my mother in law returned ANYTHING anyone ever got her so years ago we all stopped buying her gifts.
Nieces and nephews are scattered all over, and know that there is not an extended gift giving policy in this family! Everyone celebrates with their own family in the way that is meaningful to them..
Here in Az. we have a Christmas day hike with our grown children, we exchange ONE small gift (everyone knows I LOVE to receive movie going gift certificates!) I usually give our son some Chipotle Grill gift certificates. It’s his fave. lunch spot. We often drive up to Sedona and pick a red rock hike we have’t done before. I gave up cooking huge meals on holidays, we prefer to be outdoors all day.I usually leave a crock pot of pasta sauce going for when we get home..
I always ask for pictures (candid is fine!) of my extended family and my friends. My two friends that have children, I always ask for a homemade picture from the kids for my present. I absolutely love both–I also really love getting Christmas cards with messages in them, or Christmas letters. Knowing that people are thinking of me is what I really want, not more gifts to clutter up my house. I think that helps people feel like they don’t need to get me anything and takes the pressure off of them.
My dad always asks for a Christmas list from me and my husband every year. We usually ask for books that have been on our “want list”, and my husband always asks for the current Hallmark Star Trek ship ornament that is out, since he collects and displays them.
I have a dresser that is full of gifts for others, that I buy thoughout the year (getting the best prices that way). I keep a list of what I get people, and what I still need to get for people. So far I’m almost done with Birthdays, Christmases, and Mother/Father’s day gifts up through the year 2013. The only ones that I usually wait longer on are the 3-4 kids that I buy for, since they have changing tastes. I can’t have kids, so I really enjoy getting gifts for the 4 kids I buy for. I really try to get the “perfect” thought out gift for everyone, but I definitely don’t spend a lot of money! I love giving gifts, and about 3 years ago I started including a family picture in our Christmas cards to people. I usually only spend around $300 on all gifts (b-day, Christmas, etc.) per year.
Christmas is about celebrating Jesus’s birth more than anything to me.
My husband’s family is very large, and they enjoy exchanging gifts liberally. A few years ago, mother-in-law decreed that no gift for the adults should exceed $10. At first I was horrified at the thought of so many cheap gifts entering my house (even as I was happy at the reduction in expenses), but then I decided to ask for exactly what I wanted – books, fat quarters of fabric, and yarn, since I’m a crafter. The best part is that I can usually turn the yarn and fabric into a scarf or mittens or a shawl or quilt or yoga bag to give as gifts the next year.
I adore Christmas, and I love to give gifts. It’s kind of my specialty. I’m the person everyone in the family goes to when they can’t figure out what to get for someone because I can usually nail it. It gives me great joy and pleasure to give well-thought-out gifts, whether storebought or homemade.
Where I cut back on Christmas, though, is in the activities and miscellaneous gift exchanges. I really hate going to parties with the expectation of bringing a gift for some pointless gift exchange. So, I either skip the party or just don’t participate in the exchange. (For example, the women’s group at church always does one, and it’s usually themed. Everyone gives socks or scarves or $10 gift cards. What’s the point?) I also don’t participate in cookie exchanges. I hate baking cookies, so why stress myself out to do something just because it’s traditional?
Also, we only give gifts to family. Our little group of friends with whom we often celebrate birthdays and various holidays usually exchanges gifts, but I tend only to give things like homemade bread. The others are free to give us expensive gifts if they so choose, which they usually do, but we don’t reciprocate in kind. Can’t afford it, nor do we want to get caught in that cycle.
I’m actually extremely careful with our schedule in December. I see others completely stressed out over all the Christmas activities and supposed obligations, and I don’t get it. Just say no! A perfect December evening for me is being home with my husband, drinking a cup of tea, and watching a Christmas movie.
I couldn’t agree more with what most people are saying – Christmas (if you celebrate it) should be able spending quality time with family and enjoying and being thankful for what you have, not endless streams of presents. From this year we are stopping exchanging gifts with extended family (some of whom we rarely see so buy us unsuitable unwanted presents and vice versa) and friends. From now on we are only doing presents with parents and siblings and sending good wishes to everyone else. It’s such a relief and will save us and them a lot of money!!
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