I only give Christmas gifts to my kids....

[Eileen Aroon]

I tell myself it is because we don't have the money. My husband insists we don't have the money, but I think if we were really careful we could give birthday and Christmas gifts to our parents and siblings and friends and their kids. But unless I am actually invited to a Christmas or birthday where I have to look you in the face, you don't get a gift. Probably you will get a nice card, but that is it.

 

Does this make me a horrible person? Is it worth it to try to change this about myself and by extensions my marriage? I don't expect gifts for my birthday and I have never said a word of reproach to anyone for not giving me or my kids something for Christmas or whatever. Sometimes DH gets me something, sometimes not. Sometimes I splurge and get him something, but usually not.

 

I read about so many of you wonderful people who plan for months and give lovely things to all kinds of people. I admire that and I am starting to realize there is this whole culture I am missing.

[Liz CA]

Just do what you are comfortable with. In your case, there seems to be a discrepancy between your dh and your view of the finances. I would try to get him to do a budget together and see what can or cannot be done.

 

Many people do crafts for gifts which is a lovely idea if you are so inclined. I wish I was better at crafting and being creative.

[klmama]

No, it doesn't make you a horrible person! Some people are really into gift-giving. Some are not. If you and your dh are happy with the arrangement you have, that's all that matters.

[KungFuPanda]

I do the same thing! If I'm not WITH you on the holiday, I don't shop for you. None of the ridiculous exchanging of Christmas gifts in February because that's the first time we got together. I do enjoy the holidays, the concerts, the food, the family, the break from school and work . . . even watching my kids open their presents. However, I have no desire to duplicate the shopping effort for extended family members.

[bettyandbob]

No.

[Joker]

We are far away from all family so we try to do something. They all seem to love cheap wooden tree ornaments that we paint and put a picture of dds in. It's been great and they all have an awesome collection depicting dds throughout the years on their trees.

[jenn-]

I wish I could get out of exchanging with people outside what I consider my immediate family.  My BIL lives 1.5 hours away and we see his kids a handful of times a year (a few too many for me).  I have no clue what his kids are into any more then he knows what to get mine, but still I have to figure out something every year. 

[Mom22ns]

I hope it doesn't make you horrible, because if it does, we are horrible too.

 

We don't buy gifts except for our children. Dh and I don't exchange gifts ever, not once in 25 years. If we will be with someone on their birthday or a holiday, I will buy them a gift, otherwise, no gifts for friends or extended family. I don't really even do cards. I'll wish you happy birthday on Facebook, but that is it and it is all I ask in return. Gifts are not a love language spoken in my home. They don't have meaning, they are just stuff and we aren't stuff people. My dad's love language was gifts and I really tried for him because gifts meant love to him, even if they didn't mean that from me. I think as a person who doesn't do gifts, it is important to be cognizant of what gifts may mean to others to try to make sure that there is no offense.

 

Also, if it is about money and your dh, not about you being comfortable not giving gifts, that is different.

 

 

[elfgivas]

i have huge respect for people who look at the way they do life, and dare to ask "what if i did something different?"      :hurray:

 

i find a whole lot of joy in plotting and planning the surprise of gift giving.... and in sharing that with family.  are you familiar with the idea of there being five love languages?  one of them is gift giving.  it may not be yours, but it may be the love language of someone you care about.

 

 if you want to do something for someone other than your kids, then i think you could.... it would mean lots of thought and planning, but for very little money you could do one extra gift this year, and more another year.  ie.  start with your dh, and then your parents and his, and then see where you are in a few years.  one inexpensive gift: you could knit your mom/dad a scarf.  one year, i bought a four dollar box of stationary cards and gave half to my mom and kept the other half.  the gift was the promise of writing each month - letters mean a lot to the generations raised before computers.  for dh, there were many years when the gift was a cleaning of the inside of his car.  we bought balloons and filled the car with them.  (the non-helium balloons are really, really cheap, and once you blow them up, two packs of different colors will more than fill a car.  red and green for christmas, pink and red for valentine's day....).  for people i live with, i bake a favorite thing for them, or bring them breakfast in bed.  sometimes i buy a pair of tea mugs, and give one to one person and keep the other.  i put a few bags of tea in their cup, and maybe a chocolate bar.  then, off and on during the year, I call them and we have tea and chocolate "together".  this works really well for family you are emotionally close to, but where you are geographically far apart.  (far enough that just dropping by for tea isn't possible).  these ideas take time, but not very much money at all.  eg.  thrift shop tea mugs are often only twenty-five cents each.  add in a dollar for a chocolate bar, and a two dollars for tea, and that is under four dollars.  my folks love a simple framed picture of us, too.

 

all of which is a (very) long way of saying that gift giving can be from the heart, and not so much from the pocketbook.

 

hth,

ann 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Guest]

I love giving gifts to people I'm close to. I love everything about it!! Planning, ordering (Internet, FTW!!), wrapping, all of it.

 

BUT, I don't buy gifts for my DH's nieces and nephews. We aren't close. I'd just be guessing at what they want. Then, they would feel obligated to send me gifts for each if my 5 kids. Since we aren't close, they would just be guessing and I'd end up with tons of clutter.

 

So, if you feel inclined, bake some cookies and send them! Get on Pinterest and get crafty! But don't do it if you don't want to.

 

Do your kids have outside classes?? Cookies for a teacher might be a good place to start?

[Catwoman]

If you are fine with things as they are and your family and friends aren't offended when you don't give them gifts, I would say there is absolutely no reason to make any changes.

 

And I'm a person who goes crazy with gifts at Christmas, so it's not like I can't see things from the other side of the fence.

 

Basically, I'm saying that if it ain't broke, don't fix it!  :)

[kiwik]

I buy for my sons and my mother plus the one allocated person from my father/stepmother and family. At the moment we all by something for the little kids but I can see a time where we do family gifts or something. There are only 7 cousins though and two of them are mine, one a baby and two toddlers. Occasionally I buy for others if I find something I like, I bought presents for sibling until they turned 16 (I am the oldest of 7) and used to buy special treats for my grandparents. I do make token gifts for people who are there christmas day.

 

So no Christmas is not about making yourself stressed buying gifts for people who aren't there. Birthdays are a better option as they are individual and spread out.

[Joyofsixreboot]

No, you are not terrible. We are not a gift family. We usually don't even do much for the kids' birthdays. My adult kids are getting a token gas card. Gift giving is not love and caring. Other families have different ways. Do what works for you and yours.

[lynn]

That's pretty much us.  My nieces and nephews are grown.  We stopped gifts when they graduated. I do buy for parents and I have 1 great niece who I see regularly so I do buy her something.  

[Lolly]

We don't do gifts beyond our immediate family. Dh and I don't even exchange gifts, as a matter of fact. I don't get my parents a gift. We do get my sister gifts. She is unmarried with no children. We can afford to give them, we just choose not to. At one point, we did exchange gifts with all the nieces and nephews. It was getting ridiculous. The other families would give our kids money or a gift card. I tried giving something chosen especially for that child, but as they get older, that does get harder. So, we were ending up just exchanging money. (We won...we have 4 kids to everyone else's 2...) Dh and I finally just told everyone that we were not going to exchange gifts (money) anymore. Everyone seemed relieved. The kids still get stuff for my parents. They want to. Dh and I do not. My gift to them is making sure everyone makes it to their house to visit over Christmas break. Honestly, that is getting harder and harder to do!

[LifeLovePassion]

After having kids, and scaling back to one income, we stopped the exchange with our parents and siblings. It had gotten to be an exchange of $20 gift cards, which seemed crazy. My mom had the hardest time with it. We just said put your effort into the kids. None of our siblings are married or have kids. When they do, we will give gifts to the kids. 

 

That being said, now we tend to do a smaller homemade gift from the kids which seem to go over well. It gets rid of the sense of obligation and is back into a fun way to appreciate someone. It was too stressful the "mandatory" gift way. 

[SKL]

I used to do more, but I have scaled way back over the years.  How many adults need more stuff anyway?  This year most of the in-laws and out-laws are getting the Peterson's Nuts that I bought to satisfy my kids' scout fundraiser goal.  :P  I try to get one nice thing for each of my parents to show my love and appreciation (since I don't do much else for them these days).  Something small so they can fit it into their growing pile of stuff accumulated from 6 kids over the years ....

 

If I were a crafter or something, or if I got the bug to do some fun gifty craft, that would be wonderful, and I love that those projects exist to give the giver joy.  It has been a very long time since I had the time or inspiration to do that, however.

 

For some years as a young adult, I didn't even send Christmas cards.  I think that was wrong.  Now I usually send a card with a few photos of my kids.

 

I do buy one small gift for the nieces / nephews, and more for any kids who may be visiting us over Christmas.  I like to donate to charity stuff involving kids.  I usually don't come out of the Christmas season feeling like a complete scrooge.  ;)

[Night Elf]

The only adults I buy for at Christmas are my parents and DH's mom. And we do that because they spend so much on us I'd feel terrible if we didn't reciprocate. Even when the kids in the family (mine and their cousins) were little and we'd have a big Christmas lunch together, adults did not exchange gifts. I'm sure everyone felt the same way, relieved to not have to stress about it.

[MomtoCandJ]

We buy for those we see :)

[PrairieSong]

You can celebrate Christmas in whatever way works for you! Dh has a large extended family. We used to exchange names with all of his brothers and sisters, and our kids would exchange names with their cousins. We weren't buying 25 gifts. We would often go together and buy a bigger gift for his parents.

 

Now that dh's parents are both gone, we get together between Christmas and New Years' and have a white elephant gift exchange, so no one is buying anything. Some of us do buy for the grand nieces and nephews, who are 7 and under.

[happypamama]

We stopped the buying for our siblings and their children a few years ago. We live far apart and don't see each other often, so it's hard to know each other's interests. And travel makes bringing gifts home difficult for some of our siblings. Plus, we have five children, and there are only two other kids on the other side and four on my side, and I thought that five is a lot to expect anyone else to buy for, especially if they don't know them well. So now we skip the gifts and just enjoy being together whenever we have the chance. I'm totally fine with it; my siblings seem to be, so I hope they are.

[Lisbeth]

I don't think you are terrible. I have dropped the rope on most gift giving for extended family. After years of passive aggressive gifts I am just done. Example, my SIL gave me a flea market "cropped to just below the girls" sweater in size petite small...when I was 8 months preg. Even not pregnant I couldn't and wouldn't wear that. She also has given our kids her kids' dirty, worn-out,discarded toys as presents, things they wouldn't like even new. They have no money issues and are actually in good shape in that area. I don't want ANY gifts and I also don't want to fake it for her enjoyment over mean girl gifts, so I stopped gifts altogether. (Ie, I don't expect fab expensive gifts, either.) She is just one example. Extended family is so overrated.

[Ottakee]

We are not big on gift giving here either.  Even with my best friend, we just do something together.........like a nice walk and the $2.50 deal at Taco Bell and call it good.

 

Our finances are a lot tighter now than they were several years ago but we could afford it if it was a priority.  I would rather be able to send an extra $25 to a missionary or local mission than to do lots of little gifts and then have them be expected to buy stuff for us.  Even if we had double the income I don't think my philosophy would change.

 

THen again, giving gifts is not one of my love languages.

 

I have on my "to do" list today to start making lists for my kids for Christmas gifts.  We try to stay around $50/each and the kids are fine with one larger thing and a few small stocking stuffers.

[kewb]

I don't come from a gift giving family. If we got together for a birthday or holiday there were gifts but if there was no get together there were no gifts.

My sister and I tried to change it for a few years for our kids but it required a lot more effort then we were used to and we didn't maintain it.

We are always happy to get together and our kids have a great time together we just don't do the gift thing.

[gardenmom5]

I used to try and give thoughtful gifts to other family members.  I still give thoughtful gifts to dh and kids.  (my parents are deceased.)

 

there is also being creative.  you dont' have to spend alot of money on presents for other's.  my mother hated to clean.  there were a few years money was so tight, I gave my mother a gift of cleaning her house.  she loved it - she liked a clean house, just absolutely hated to do it.  I've had older starving-student kids give me a "coupon" for babysitting/taking dudeling to the park.  one year my kids even had a friend take a picture of all of them - and gave me that in a frame.  (how they got dudeling to cooperate, I don't know.  he loaths his picture being taken and tantrums/meltdowns if he sees a camera facing his direction aren't unusual.)

I have a friend who makes divinity and sends it to her siblings.  she was really surprised one year by her affluent (for a) lawyer brother who wanted to make sure he was getting his divinity becasue he looked forward to it every year. 

 

I used to do very inexpensive gifts for nieces/nephews who lived here and i saw regularly. when money was super tight - I gave individual kids german chocolate advent calendars.  I would give them at thanksgiving, as we were hosting.  if you look at how much an individual card costs - it's about the same, and cheaper than some.

then as they got older, I did family gifts. (game sets, movie baskets, etc.)  now nieces and nephews are adults and having kids.  I give token gifts to their children/family (age appropriate game, a dvd, etc. usually something that would appeal to a homeschooler.) - but not individual gifts to them. 

 

I've also given up giving thoughtful gifts to people who plonk down $5 for a dvd they don't even have time to wrap.

 

but now my kids are (mostly) adults.

 

 

[catz]

Some people's love language involves carefully shopping for and giving gifts.  I think it is perfectly fine NOT to be this person. I think the average American has more than enough STUFF and I would actually love to drop gift exchanges with aunts/uncles/cousins.  And honestly, most of the gifts they give are thoughtless junk or a gift card.  I would be kicked out of both sides of the family for the mere suggestion however.  I'm already dreading the get together with my brother we won't have time for until after the holidays.

 

If that's working for your family, I think it's fine. 

[Eileen Aroon]

Thank you for all the feedback. It is nice to know I am not the only functional adult not giving everyone I know gifts this year. As a few of you mentioned, it isn't one of my languages of love. I prefer acts of service or time alone. But that could just be my time of life because those are true luxuries around here.

 

I think I will write lovely cards to the people I love. A keepsake letter telling them how important they are to me. I like to write, and I think people get a kick out of reading about themselves. I guess that is a "Words of Appreciation" gift. The only crafty thing that doesn't turn out looking like a preschooler's mistake that I can do is cross-stitch. I think when my kids are a little older I could do a nice something or other along those lines.

 

To those who are wonderful gift-givers (as in shopping, planning, crafting), I can see I am missing something virtuous in myself, but at this point I don't think it is worth the effort to change. 

[Tsuga]

I do cards. We adults do a book exchange, and I get one thing for my partner to open on Christmas morning. The kids get a few things. That's it.

 

I prefer other traditions. I love caroling, I love lights, candles, and special books and poems. I like the food. I like making gingerbread houses.

 

I do NOT like The Invasion of Plastic Crap and Crafts Which Although I Deeply Admire Their Artistry / Your Thoughtfulness, Really I Do, Will Not Fit on the One Remaining Surface in My Home Which Is Not Covered by Crafts and Trinkets of Previous Years, Which Anyway Is the Kitchen Counter and We Need That Space to Make Food.

 

That said, I do love my family and I love the holidays! I'm not a grinch. It just isn't about stuff for me.

[Deb in NZ]

I make up a big platter of homemade Christmas cookies for each of dh's siblings & his mum.  I, also, make up smaller platters as an end-of-the-year thank you for coaches, scout leaders, etc.  My family is half a world away, so I only send cards.  When my mom was alive I would get a small gift for her & for my dad.  Now we get my dad a NZ calendar.  I do take a small gift for each niece & nephew when we return  to the States for a visit every 5 years or so.  The high cost of postage got just too much for us as the years went by.

 

We try to limit our dc's gifts to experiences (i.e. National Sea Scout Regatta, Hockey camp, etc.) + 4 gifts:

• Something they want
• Something they need
• Something to wear
• Something to read

Dh & I don't usually exchange gifts.

 

 

[sewingmama]

We don't see any family at christmas and only buy gifts for our own kids. Grandma sometimes sends gifts but it depends if its a year she can afford to buy for all the grandkids. Grandma does buy gifts every year for the grandkids she actually sees.

 

I think we all just accept that we are all not well off and we all struggle to get gifts for our own family let alone for everyone else's. Plus our kids don't actually need anything ...so its pointless to spend limited money on gifts for kids that already have tons and you don't even know if they will like it or play with it.

 

This year though for the first time I am sending a gift to two of my nieces... my Brother and SIL have custody of my niece and her own parents are not doing a great job of providing for her needs so it is more helping them out with expenses then gift giving I guess. She has asked for back to school stuff so I will send that plus a small gift to let her know we care. My other young niece that she lives with will get a gift too out of politeness but the two teenagers will get nothing...they understand why my niece would get a gift and not them. I just can't afford a gift for everyone.