Aries
Taurus
Gemini
Cancer
Leo
Virgo
Libra
Scorpio
Sagittarius
Capricorn
Aquarius
Pisces"No Gifts" Means NO GIFTS!
Guest blogger Emily: This year I made a deal: No Gifts. I agreed with my family, including my husband, that this year we would not exchange gifts. Nothing. Nada. Zilch.
This year, instead of buying everyone a gift, I decided we would take what little funds we do have and make a donation on everyone's behalf to a charity. Alas, NO ONE, including my husband, followed through on the deal! They broke the pact and I now look like an a**.
"Noooo! Don't worry!" they'd say, handing me a lovely gift as I sat there blushing in disbelief. "It's just a little something! I picked it out months ago!" SO??? Is that supposed to make me feel better about the fact that I didn't buy you sh*t?! Not even a card! I mean, I felt awful. But frankly, while I appreciate the thought, I actually think it's kind of rude. It's like showing up with your kids to an "adults only" wedding, or showing up to a dinner party after having eaten dinner! It's rude. A deal is a deal and a pact is a pact -- especially in this economic climate!
Like many families in this country, mine is having a tough time navigating through rocky financial times. All of our excess funds are being poured into "essentials only," and we're having to make slashes in our spending left and right. Obviously, the decision to cut back on gifts and presents during the holiday season was not an easy one. Who doesn't like to give and receive? But I'm disappointed in my family for not honoring my decision, our agreement actually, and essentially "showing me up" and making me look like the Grinch who stole Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanzaa -- and even New Year's. I suck!
Look, the fact that my husband went out of his way to buy me a purse I had my eye on for a while was very sweet, but I'd be willing to put money (that I really don't have) on the fact that he was secretly hoping that I'd have a little gifty-poo up my sleeve too. Well, guess what, I don't. I hadn't even thought about it, and now I feel like I am forced to -- and to me, that's exactly what the holidays are NOT all about ...
Should people stick to the "no-gift policy," or is Emily really the Grinch? Tell us what you think!
- share:
-
-
-
more:
- |
- 14 Comments
My brother his girlfriend, my brother-in-law and Sister-in-Law have all have tough years as well. I didn’t care that I got them stuff and they didn’t get us anything. I really like giving better than I like getting. And that is what big sisters are for!
Hang tough, Emily. I am hoping the No-Gift thing catches on. We did it this year. I didn’t get anything for any friends, relatives, teachers, nuthin’. If I’m not getting my KIDS Christmas presents, you can be CERTAIN I’m not getting you anything. We went No-Gift because of the cost, but now that we’ve done it, it felt great. Best x-mas ever. All about love and lights; no stuff, no junk.
argh i hate it also. totally feel cheap.
You are cheep. You don’t have to spend a lot to gie a gift, ever heard of home made? My husband and I got a donation of chickens in our name to some wacked up 3rd world country last year, while I appreciate thesentiment, I don’t know of those chickens ever actually got to that farmer. As someone who has some background in nonprofit work I can tell you that often, especially with larger charity organizations, a lot, if not most of your donation goes to overhead, of course that’s proportional on your donation. So when you encourage giving to charity organizations and tell you kids that it’s helping people etc you may as well be telling them the truth, “kid, this is economics and instead of giving you a gift this Christmas mom and dad are going to help purchase office supplies for your favorite charity.” Give the gift of simplicity and give something from your heart whatever that is. Oh and get a life, you’re holier than though attitude is bogus. Not buying gifts in favor of a donation doesn’t make you a saint.
Wow anonymous, who pooped under your Christmas tree? Nice attitude.
My wife and I decided to just go out to a nice dinner together in lieu of getting each other gifts. We got our son (2.5yo) a train table that we probably would have gotten him anyway (bought on Craigslist for 1/3 of retail)- but really he’s too young to care. While I don’t think Emily’s being the Grinch, I do think she could stand to loosen up a little. As the first commenter said, she laid it out there, everyone agreed to the idea, so it’s not her problem or fault that everyone else went back on the agreement.
I feel the same way. I only bought gifts this year for my two kids and no one else, not even the hubby. We sent out Christmas Cards to everyone else. I also love to buy gifts for others, what I don’t love are the left over credit card bills. This year will be the first year we will start a new year without any credit card debt. :)
Well you sound like a b!tch, quite frankly. I mean you couldn’t get your kids 1 gift? Your probably one of those rich bastards that lost everything, and no one cares so all i have to say…sux 2 be u.
I think people are missing the point of the post. The point isn’t to get approval for the decision the family made together, the matter at hand is that the family didn’t stick to the agreement.
Jessica,
How do you know she even has kids? No where in this post did it mention her kids, not all married people have them you know. Family could be anybody from parents to Aunts, Uncles, Sisters , Cousins… Don’t be so quick to condemn.
Personally, we haven’t done gifts for adults in a REALLY long time… Pretty much when all my friends started having kids… I feel like the holidays are really about the kids anyhow. By next year, we may pare down even more, but this year, we stuck with kids only - it’s still expensive. I feel like it’s rude, and NOT at all in the spirit of the holidays to decide with another person that you’re going to do something and then go against that. Especially in this economy. You really don’t know what people’s financial situations are, despite outward appearances.
Christmas is about love and generousity. God’s presnet to us was given mankind his only begotten son.
However, anyone wants to express that love, via gifts - store bought or homemade, gathering around the Christmas drinking punch and singing carols so be it.
If you decide to exclude gifts from the holiday then INCLUDE soemthing expressing the sentiment of the season. A letter, a poem, finally putting together a the family photo album.
It really is about the thought and not the gift.
The blogger should except the gifts because they most likely were given out of love and generousity. And I think the family knew why she didn’t send out any presents and probablely accepted that without condemnation for the blogger.
We decided kids only this year and I felt weird…I wanted to buy for the adults too ~ but that is what was agreed on…One family did give some candy and pictures to the adults and that was okay, but I did feel bad that I didn’t reciprocate. I think just give what you want without the rules already…no one should expect anything anyway ~ right? If you gave to a charity in their name then that was your gift so you shouldn’t feel bad at all :)
“You don’t have to spend a lot to gie a gift, ever heard of home made?” anonymous - homemade gifts are sweet up until a certain point and that certain point is when it is from a 7 year old child. Home meade gifts from adults are typically tacky crafty pieces of junk that will wind up in my trash, so please lets not encourage that. Also, home made does not equal no cost. If she didn’t want to exchange gifts and she made it clear she didn’t she shouldn’t have to spend money and time to make “homemade” items that no one wants anyway. Waste of money
Don’t feel badly for not getting them a gift, they knew the deal, they agreed to it and if they were hoping you would secretly buy them something, well thats their problem. It’s not like they weren’t forewarned.
I understand this is much easier said than done but you can’t control their actions only your reactions. Let them feel like crap because they took money away from a charity by breaking the pact.