early christmass

[Mike]

ok so last week some radio channels started really earlt with 24 7 music.   and there are movies on hallmark already but tonight I went to the market and there was a bell ringer before thanksgiving really?

[gene]

Our clock in the kitchen was changed last weekend to play Christmas songs on the hour.

My future son-in-law, on orders from my wife, put up the Christmas tree tonight.

It feels like Christmas around here and we haven't even had Thanksgiving dinner yet.

I know I'm not going to get any toys for Christmas (unless I buy them for myself) so the entire season has lost a lot of it's meaning for me.

gene

[kodydog]

I can't wait till Christmas is an all year thing. Christmas every day, can't get any better than that. Christmas in July, wouldn't that be great. Oh wait they already do that.

[SteveA]

There are people in sleeping bags outside of Best Buy waiting for the Thanksgiving sales or the sales the day after - who knows !   They have already been there for three days and there is still about two weeks to go.
SA

[Mike]

When i was young i used to wait till the last minute to shop. Christmass eve many times when i saw what i had for money at the end of the month.

[kodydog]

When I was a kid my parents would give each if us $100 to buy presents for each member of the family, Pretty amazing considering I have 3 sisters and two struggling parents in the 70's. This tradition continued into adult hood and carried on to include brother-in-laws and nieces and nephews. It started to get expensive to the point Rose and I were going into debt each year. And way to much anxiety. So one year I suggested to this now large family, we buy presents for the kids only and pick names out of a hat for the adults. Some thought this was a great idea and some thought it was terrible. But we did it anyway. And after a while even that faded away to just buying presents for our parents. And I've got to tell you Christmas is now so much more enjoyable and relaxing.

[sofadoc]

For the first 20 or so years of our marriage, my MIL always gave us a paid subscription to TV Guide. We never told her that it went straight to the trash an every week. Then she started giving us a paid subscription for weather alert phone calls in the middle of the night. We never told her that we blocked the calls.

She gives all the women in the family some stupid knick-knack that could be found just beyond the shopping carts at Wally World.

Me and the BIL's always get some identical set of knives, or screwdrivers (again, not far from the Wally World entrance).

I wouldn't be surprised at all to learn that the presents we gave her were just as unappreciated. But at least we didn't buy from the "impulse rack" at Wal-Mart.

The last few years, the whole family has agreed to just buy presents for the children (mostly toys).

Me and my wife spend WELL under the national average at Xmas time.

There are people in sleeping bags outside of Best Buy waiting for the Thanksgiving sales or the sales the day after - who knows !   They have already been there for three days and there is still about two weeks to go.

I never understood that. Don't those people realize that if they just worked a job during the hours that they spend camped out in front of a retail store, they could just pay regular price, and have money left over?

[Virgs Sew n Sew]

When we moved back to Grand Island nine years ago, after living in the not-so-great state of Kansas for almost 25 years, I started to get Christmas issues.  When we lived in Kansas, everyone would make lists of things their little hearts desired and we would all shop from that.  I was fine with that as at least we were getting things we needed/wanted.

Once we moved back, suddenly MIL and SIL decided that they knew what we needed.  I was barely handling that and the last year we bought, my nephew went shopping for gifts for the first time.  I don't remember what he bought Bob but he bought me this horrendous looking sweater that was 4 sizes too large for me.  His mother confessed that he bought her exactly the same sweater (size and color both).  I asked her why on earth she let her son go shopping without providing him with correct sizes at least.  She didn't speak to me for several months which I was OK with.

Bob and I talked about it and came to a solution.  At the next family gathering, he brought up Christmas and told them that we (he and I) pretty much buy whatever we want, unless it is prohibitively expensive.  So that means we understand that they might think we are hard to shop for.  Our suggestion was that we stop buying for each other and instead I registered us with the United Way to adopt a family that otherwise was not going to have a Happy Christmas.  We did and that year we all had an absolute blast buying for our family.  We did that for 3 or 4 years.  Last year, they didn't call us and by the time the article appeared in the paper that they still needed adoptive people, you had like 2 days to shop, wrap and deliver to the United Way.  I was sewing dresses for customers to wear Christmas Eve so that time frame didn't cut it with me.  I went to the Mall where they have trees with wish lists and bought some stuff for those lists as you didn't have to wrap and just delivered it to the Information Center at the Mall.

MIL is in a Nursing Home this year.  There are quite a few residents who have been "dumped and forgotten" by family members so this year I talked to the Activities Director at the NH and she sent me a wish list for a couple of the residents and Bob & I are going to be their Secret Santas.  As long as MIL is in the NH, this is what we will probably do.  I think it's probably just as important, if not more important, for those older people to find gifts to open Christmas Eve or Day.  It just breaks my heart sometimes when we go there.  Some of those people are just so starved for human contact.  If you just hold their hand, they are practically in tears.  Very sad.  So we have made it a point to stop and talk with them and joke with a couple of the ladies now.

At any rate, I have the best time on Christmas Day, imagining how thrilled the recipients are with our gifts.  I walk around with a huge smile all day long.  Makes Christmas just incredible by doing this.

My brother tried to bring me down one year by saying that we didn't know if those kids were really underprivileged.  Our response was that the United Way vets those families and we are trusting that the United Way is doing their job correctly.  As many families sign up, I cannot imagine that the United Way is not thorough as they are generally scrambling up to the last minute to get each family adopted so my feeling is that they make darn sure that these families are truly needy.  If not, so it goes.  Now that we are doing the Nursing Home, I'm trusting the Activities Director as well.

Virginia

[gene]

I suggested that this year we pick a charity and instead of giving each other presents we give that money to the charity.

My son, who is 30, said, "Hey, on one of two days each year that I can be totally selfish you want me to think of others?

My idea got nixed.

gene

PS: My motivation about the charity was as much about helping others as it was about getting people to stop buying me crap made in China for Christmas.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Vxhgo8ZUP0

[Darren Henry]

IMHO Christmas has gotten way too commercial. Our thanksgiving is in Oct. , and the retailers replaced the Halloween display with X-mas stuff. There was a buzz of discontent that people were putting their christmas lights etc... out on or before remembrance day. Back when dinosaurs ruled I worked in the mall here in Brandon. they played the same 45 minute loop of carols from the middle of november until new years. I would actually turn on my finisher [that sanding/grinding thing shoe maker use] just to drown out the noise.

Gifts; huh! experlative!  I'm 50 years old and have stuff stored in two locations in Kenora, my motor home and a shed at work here in Brandon. I don't need "stuff". I wouldn't mind a tank of gas, or a pricey chunk of meat that I wouldn't buy for myself---otherwise forget it. My ex-inlaws spend so much that it is pointless to try to gift my niece and her girls or my nephew. My f'n step sons buy themselves the " I just gotta have's" the minute it comes out and then have their mother "borrow" money from me to buy groceries, smokes etc...Pointless!

I like Verg's option. Put the money to good use. The last Christmas gift I got from Dad was a receipt that $200 had been donated to some charity in my name. I could have REALLY the tank of gas /some meat at that point in time --but hey,it's all good.