Is it over yet?

morganb

This sums it up for us this year; we had a fantastic Christmas, Santa was very kind to the children and we all had a great meal on Xmas Day and a great buffet in the evening ... sausage rolls, turkey sandwiches, crisps, pork pies, etc., etc., kept making an appearance for the next couple of days. When I cooked salmon, couscous, peas and sweetcorn on Saturday, my two looked at their plates, looked up at me and said 'Oh, thank you Mummy'.

Guess we can all have too much of a good thing!

3KIDSNOMONEY

Feel much the same. I love Christmas but you get to the stage when you think, what's the point?

I have three young children and the build up is nice with them buying presents, putting the tree up, school plays, etc. But by Christmas afternoon I just want to take the tree down, tidy away the toys and get back to normal. My family don't really celebrate Christmas and we always end up at the in-laws for lunch. Was determined not to go this year and do it at home, but for an easy life we went. Note to self: Do it myself next year, even if we have chips!

This year I tried to put a lot of effort into what to buy people, hamper ideas from this site were great. Things have got far too commercialised and it annoys me when we receive cards of people saying how special we are, when we never see them except if we bump into them by accident.

Think we all need to take more time to enjoy the little things about Christmas, being together, playing card games, etc. In fact that is what I am going to try to take into the new year, enjoying the little things, not always spending.

li'l_p

My brother's and I gather at my parent's, usually around mid-day after we have dropped our OH's off at their parents and we spend the about 2 hours opening gifts; it takes so long because we each take a turn opening a present each. We started this several years ago and it's stuck ever since. It's more special because you get to see everyone open each gift and it's not all lost in a 10 minute frenzy of present opening with no regard to what's being opened.

Like kay41 we also tend to give a lot of jokey type presents too, and by that I don't mean novelty socks, etc. This year, I made retro sweets baskets for my brothers which were filled with all the sweets from when we were kids (...they went down a storm)!. I also picked up a really dodgy VHS film for my brother - long story but stems from a family joke from a few years ago. We also bought my Mum some Rosemary Conley fitness videos, because she used to exercise to them and we just used to poke fun about them. Other people would be offended if they got the stuff we give, but for us it's all just a bit of light hearted fun and takes the commercialism out of Christmas.

Too many people go all out to get the latest and greatest gifts, etc, especially when it comes to getting the latest toys for kids - problem is, the sentiment of giving/receiving is lost, not to mention that these kids who get everything never get an idea of budgets/limitations and the kids expectations simply get higher as they demand more expensive things for which the parents then have to then stretch themselves to obtain.

I have enjoyed Christmas, as I do every year, but only because we've made it what it was ...quality time spent with family and loved ones.

Happy New Year to you all!