I save all year to buy things I want or need.
Already started saving for new washer and dryer.
Now that I got the new laptop off my wish list.
I didn't ask oldest son to help pay for laptop, even though Granny and grand daughter broke it.
Cause I knew he couldn't afford it.
When my boys were small, their birthday and Christmas budgets were $25 for each.
Now that they're grown men with lives of their own, I buy or make family gifts.
That $500 per gift on her list and she had 20 gifts on that list would pay off my car and then some.
Everybody is for a rude awaking this Christmas.
I figure by Christmas, I will have new washer and dryer, because she won't be able to keep up with the payments.
Buying things on time(credit) is not in your best interest.
They borrowed money from me last week.
She got paid yesterday.
To me logical thing would have been paid me back.
Nope, wasted money on frivious things instead.
She dang sure didn't buy food.
Instead she bought each of her kids a new outfit apiece x 3.
New toy apiece x 3.
Getting ready to start laundry.
I just read this tonight. I think it is pretty sad that parents are teaching their children this about Christmas and being indignant about it. The parents have missed the boat in what Christmas is about and they are passing that mis-perception on to their children. I don't believe in going into debt for gifts. I do know that it is a thing for people to go overboard for Christmas.
As a writing activity when I was teaching, I had students write their Christmas wish lists. After the winter break, they would write what they actually got and from whom. Then I would have them write thank you notes. There was so much information about home life and values in the lists.
Our daughter got some nice gifts for Christmas, with her dad and I working together on them, me doing the shopping, him doing the assembly. Nothing was $500 or even close. What I remember getting for Christmas as a kid: a doll, a doll bed, a half slip one year, a poor boy sweater another year. We got one game as a family for Christmas some years: Monopoly, Scrabble, Parcheesi. Those games got lots of use throughout the years.
For us, Christmas is always more about being together and doing things together: decorating the Christmas tree, setting up the Nativity scene, decorating the house, hanging the stockings, hanging the Advent calendar, baking and decorating cookies, singing Christmas carols, reading Christmas stories, having a good meal or two. We often have a meal of latkes with sour cream and applesauce for Hanukkah to remember that Jesus never celebrated Christmas, but he did celebrate Hanukkah.
When I was a kid we visited our grandparents on the ranch and then visited aunts and uncles and cousins. That is what I remember about Christmas. We got small gifts, but not expensive. No one had a bunch of money and no one got expensive gifts. I would buy my grandmothers handkerchiefs. Men might get socks, t-shirts, or handkerchiefs. There was always plenty of homemade candy, cookies, pies and cakes. Going to Midnight mass was a thing for my Catholic grandparents and coming home and eating oyster stew.
I remember being with someone and his 100 year old dad. Dad wanted to go look at Christmas lights. NO! I asked what was wrong with going to look at Christmas lights and decorations? We went. Doing something simple like that and then going home and having hot cocoa and cookies is memorable for many children.
