Philadelphia Nesties
larrysdarling
member
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
I'm pretty sure I'm quitting Christmas...
...next year. I just spent my entire lunch break running around fruitlessly. Went to HomeGoods/marshalls for bean bags. No go but there were over 30 people in line.
Stopped to return something at Macy's and got stuck in line behind a woman returning 10 items (2nd line I was in). The men's cologne counter was out of the cologne I needed.
I have 10 people to buy for still. I have no idea what to buy and I feel like I'm just wasting money just so I can buy something.
Christmas is ruining my enjoyment of Christmas.
Next year, I'm buying for Big Lar, Little L, and that's it. Maybe I'll make a big vat of spaghetti sauce and meatballs and give that.
Otherwise I'm done.
Re: I'm pretty sure I'm quitting Christmas...
This.
I keep telling dh that we need to stop exchanging, but he is such a little kid that he needs to have something to open on christmas morning.
i went with the blunt- this is getting ridiculous. let's adopt a family, go shopping for them together and then go out to dinner. the response was- you're totally right. that is a great idea.
starting next year i have already eliminated 4 people from the list. boo-ya! i am now working on a few more to get the list to reasonable.
ld- i am thinking we may move to craft/cookies from ds and that is it for some people too. it is just too much running, pressure, money. sucks the joy right out of it.
It's funny you say that because I do DIY gifts for my friend and I was totally thinking about doing dried pasta for next year. I would love to get that or some homemade sauce!
We have really streamlined our gifts over the past few years. For our family kids get gifts and that's it. Dh and I exchange gifts but we don't go nuts. This year I did break down and get a gift for my parents but I got them gifts from Tommy because they help out so much during the year by traveling down here to watch him when I have my many doctor visits. Then I do some DIY gifts for my close friends.
Ever since we drastically cut the list my Christmas has been much more enjoyable and honestly I don't think anyone misses the gifts. I don't really care that we don't get gifts from our relatives anymore because I feel like a gift for Tommy is basically a gift for us. I also used to get a lot of gifts that were totally not my taste and I would spend hours in line making returns that equaled to hardly any store credit because no one gives receipts. It's just not worth it.
AMEN!
I have done very minimal shopping . We had a lot of bills and other things to pay for these past 2 months, and I just feel like money is being burned.
And I hate hate hate the buying random gifts to exchange because I feel obligated. MIL is bringing her boyfriends daughter, her baby daddy, and her 3 kids to Christmas dinner. I'm ok with that. The more the merrier. But then she told us she expects us to give them gifts. And I feel bad because every little kid in the house is going to be getting presents. How can I not get those babies a gift? So add 5 more people.... ugh. It's just getting so out of hand.
I've got no problem being blunt.
But I'll be nice about it.
I feel like I need to find a way back to how we used to celebrate Christmas. I used to love driving around looking at decorated houses and watching Christmas movies. The commercialism of the holiday has really gotten to me the past few years.
Tammy- Maybe just grab a few things from Five Below to give to the extra kids that are showing up. It will show you made an effort, and it won't break the bank.
I also forgot to mention DHs birthday is 2 days before Christmas and it always got lost in the shuffle with his family. So sad. I always made sure he has a birthday, so I get him something, even though it is right before Christmas. We always have his cake on Christmas Eve at my parents' house and we go out to dinner on his actual day which is a great way to get into good restaurants, because they are usually empty then.
My DH's birthday was Fri. He hates having his birthday near Christmas, though he never gets shorted b/c his family loves presents. But his parents brought over his gift on Saturday wrapped in red wrapping paper that says, "HO HO HO".
I could have throat punched them.
No way!
I am sure l and m will have tons of this growing up. But I'm your own parents?
I swear if someone gives my kid a birthday gift in Christmas wrapping, I'll unwrap it in front of them and rewrap it myself.
ETA: Ok, maybe not. But I'd try to rewrap it if I could. That's just all sorts of wrong, IMO.
Jonathan Dean 4.5.08
Anna Capri 5.4.11
LD - Ho Ho Ho paper?!? That is so wrong for someone whose birthday is two weeks from Christmas.
I also need to start some shopping. More and more online shopping for me every year.
Yep. Couldn't make it up if I wanted to.
i hear ya. I have a small shopping list of 5 immediate family members but thats still taxing for me! I was just thinking that Id like my daughter's christmas memories to be less about shopping and gifts and more about family time, holiday songs and events etc. I think Im going to start a tradition like this one next year with DD, except probably weekly rather than daily, I cant keep up with daily!
http://tsjphotography.com/blog/random-acts-of-christmas-kindness-summary/
I'm so glad my parents, sister and I don't exchange gifts for Hanukkah, and we no longer exchange with extended family and SILs/BILs.
We'd rather just do something together than get a gift. FIL asked us what we wanted, and I told him to just get something off the registry. He said "don't you want something more personal?" He also sent us a detailed list of gift options. We don't want anything! We have lots of stuff!
Why can't we just get together, have a potluck, and hang out with each other? Why do we all need more stuff?
i hate lines! online all the way!
i'm not looking forward to wrapping though. and lugging. and traveling.
This year I told my family to give gifts to the baby only, not to worry about gifts for DH & me. Some people found that funny, for whatever reason.
mmmmm..... And your choc chip cookies too. No one could complain about that. I just made your recipe for meatballs last week, but it wasn't the same without your sauce.
Aw thanks friend. That's sweet of you!
I never send Christmas cards. I send Valentine's and St. Patrick's Day cards. Yes, the Valentine thing is totally a bs Hallmark money grab, but there's so much going on leading up to Christmas, I just don't have my act together.