christmas and the economy kind of a poll

malibou-kar

we really want to cut back on the spending this year, and want to ask our close friends/family to do the same. 

are you adjusting your christmas spending due to the economy?

if so, how are you adressing it with friends and family?

does anyone "draw names" or just buy for the kids? if so - how did you kick off that tradition? i feel like EVERYONE buys gifts for EVERYONE until it is SO completely out of control and ridiculous...

MommeyDevine

Well this year the family decided to be very creative and "frugal" so we decided to make crafty gifts for each other due to the crisis. Alot of the family already said they would not be able to buy gifts this year. Totally understandable.

WishIwereahousewife

I had dinner with the inlaws last night and they TOLD me that their side of the family is drawing names (but they have always done this). It makes me feel uncomfortable. It's not ok to not get DH's grandma something right?

So I told her that I was planning on getting everyone something - but I would make it from $5-$10 if they want to do the same that's fine. I'm just not comfortable not getting family anything.

jaymewilson12

We are just buying for my step son which I got finished with today.    We've already talked to my family and plan to talk to DH's family about it this weekend.  We can't afford to buy everyone gifts and everyone understands.  We'll probably do a framed picture of Casey or something for the grandparents.

AlisaS

We draw names. It sucked at first but honestly, how many things do you need from the Body Shop? My sisters and I don't exchange either - we just go out to dinner.

Grandmas and kids always get something.

I posted a question on the multiples board about fun gifts for 2 year-olds and this woman posted about all the things she got her twins - the list was a mile long.  Why? Her kids are TWO!

I think if you throw out the "times are tough, let's go easy", people will thank you.

 

princess_shelly

Since Jacob & nephew were born, we decided to always only do the kids! ?It works out better that way & I really don't care if I get a gift from the IL's or my mom, it is really just about Jacob.

anitanichole

I'm glad you posted this as you reminded me to make sure that DH and I talk to everyone about this. Frankly, I don't care for gifts and I want to tell everyone not to buy anything; I'd prefer that we all just be together and thats it. We don't have many kids in the family so the focus should strictly be on them.

julnmatt

We celebrate with my extended family on Christmas eve, my parents and bro and sis on Christmas morning and Matt's parents on Christmas evening. Extended family, we do a white elephant...however, I may not participate, depending on who goes. I usually get 'stuck" with some stupid piece of crap-but that is a whole other can of worms. Immediate family: We get for my parents and then draw names and have the limit set to $50. It works well because there are just 5 of us and we usually just tell the person what we want and make it easy. This way, we don't have to get something cheap for 4 others, just one nice thing for someone. My parents still spoil us and get us a ton of stuff. Matt's family: Draw names on Thanksgiving and buy for one adult. There are 8 kids and we buy each something to open. Ugh-this is where we go broke! We also get for Matt's parents and his sisters 3 kids.

tmp-535278437507318

Kids, parents and grandparents always get stuff from us.

We draw names on both sides of the family, but it seems that both our moms ignore the "game plan" and still get us stuff.

We all seem to be feeling the pinch this year, so I think we'll all be scaling back.  Not sure how much tho.  Maybe we'll just cut back on the $$$ amounts spent instead of completely ousting the gift giving to the adults.

Jenn09/04

We are cutting back a lot this year. We just have too much going on in the next few months and are trying to get our savings back up to where it should be.

We always buy just for the kids in the family. We are cutting back on the amount that we are spending per kid this year. We usually spend $50-100 for nieces and nephews and $250+ on our own kids. This year the nieces and nephews are getting no more than $25, Rhian and Reese have $75-100 limits, and we're still not sure what we're getting Michaela but things for her are a bit more so we may spend up to $200 for her.

 

BrownEyedBombshell

We're cutting waaaaaay back this year! All of our extended family is using Elfster for our Secret Santa, and it worked out awesome last year! The little kids usually get presents from everyone and since we only have 4 little kids it doesnt get crazy. The adults participate in the Secret Santa, and it saves everyone so much money.

This year, DH & I are mainly going to focus on Victoria. We might get each other stocking stuffers, but we'd rather buy her presents instead, but we're not gonna go crazy. She's only gonna be 10 1/2 months, so we'll give her a few presents, but I'm sure she'll happily play with the bags & paper than her presents!

 I love buying people presents and I'm so sad that we can't do that this year. Money is way to tight, and the bills just never stop coming! Hopefully the economy will turn around by this time next year, and it won't be so stressful of a holiday.

myonetruelove

I buy for immediate family: G-ma, mom, brother family (4), 2 sisters, Godson. We do an exchange between the other familys (my moms brothers and sisters and their family) to assure we don't pick someone from our family.

DH family does not celebrate christmas. DH does only to make me happy, but we don't exchange he only participates in my family's gift exchange.

I have a group of friends that we do a gift exhange. We have been doing it since high school. This year we have decided to do an ornament exchange to keep the price down.

I'm trying to avoid any other gift exchanges! I will keep my price down and really bargain shop this year.

Fenella

I wish DH's family would do a secret santa. He has a huge family that all live close by!!! This year I decided I am going to bake gifts for the adults and just buy small gifts for the kids. Our immediate family will still get gifts, but less $$ than normal. We just got hit with mold repairs so we have to pay $2K in inurance deductible. Ouch! and I just got my embroy storage fee bill, which now went up to $700. It never ends...I think most people are probably going to scale back this year. I told my sisters too, not to get DH and I gifts and only buy something little for the boys if they want.

Maybe this economy will help change the focus of the holidays into quaility time with friends and family, rather than on $$ and gifts. I know I am usually stressed out by the end trying to get last minute gifts for everyone.

 

Kari: totally adorable sigg pic of Liam!

mmed58

We only buy for immediate family and the limit is $50 per couple.  We try to use our points from credit cards, miles, etc. to buy alot of the gifts.  DH and I don't get each other anything...sometimes we do something small, but it is very small.  We also won't buy Joaquin anything this year as he is so young...we'll put the $ in his college account instead. 

 This is pretty much how we usually live though, so not much of a change for us.

G91705

We usually do immediate family also, parents, siblings, nieces, nephews, etc.  We will definitely cut down on the cost per gift though.  We might do a gift exchange with dh's extended family but no one has really discussed it yet.

hulachick

I think our whole family is in the same boat! I let my family know that they shouldn't feel pressured to get Dh and I gifts for xmas. It's not about the gifts to me We have alot of family and extended family so we plan on doing "family gifts" as opposed to a gift for each person.

Mindymo25

We draw names, in fact, we use Elfster!  Kids and grandmas always get a present.  We actually draw two names.  One for a gift and one for a stocking.

insominac

My dad's side of the family has the most stupidest tradition imaginable. ?

It's a $50 gift card exchange and each person specifies the location of the gift card store. ?So last year I had to drive to Bloomingdales to purchase a gift card for my uncle's lame wife. ?Why I couldn't give her $50 cash, I have no idea. ?

shellybellmw

We are buying only for the kids in the family, however even that is getting ridiculous because once you buy for nieces, nephew, cousins, etc it ends up being 20 different little ones.  Especially because dh has a HUGE family!  We draw names for the adults on each side so we end up only buying 2 adult gifts,  plus gifts for our parents.  I'm being super frugal with kids gifts this year and only spending $10-$15 on each one.  I'm doing coloring books, dvds, marker sets, etc.  For families with a group of kids I'm doing simple movie night baskets and labeling it for the whole family.

joolz425

My 2 cents. I'm kind of a holiday grinch. I do not like holidays. I'm probably in the minority, but I think holidays are a waste of money. I don't think people should go into debt because they feel obligated to buy people things. If you can't afford it, don't feel obligated to buy everyone a gift. I'm all for getting people a gift for birthdays, but not sure why people feel the pressure to buy everyone something all at one time. It's stressful.

How about starting a new tradition and donating to charity instead on their behalf.

I'm not adjusting my spending habits due to the economy, I just don't subscribe to the commercial exploitation aspect of it. Think of all the packaging and wrapping that's going to end up in landfills.

I'm prob just gonna buy my MIL something b/c it's also her Bday around x mas and maybe my sister. I'm not getting my friends or coworkers anything for x mas. They can expect a gift on their birthdays.