With Thanksgiving behind us we are free to concentrate on Christmas, and the stress of shopping.
Like many families, we will be scaling back on gifts this year. I survived the most recent layoff at my company, but more are coming early next year. Until the economy has a sustained turnaround, I don’t think too many of us can count on our jobs as given. At least I can’t.
And so others are asking me for gift ideas for Krystal and Belle. I suppose I should be glad – with more people to buy for them, they get more stuff than I could give them alone. But my issues are these: it is often challenging for me to think of things to get them myself, without coming up with “extra” items to pass along to others, and they just don’t need more stuff! Both of them have more than enough clothes to last them at least another year, and with very few exceptions, they don’t play with toys. I did get an American Girl doll for Krystal and Belle will be getting a scooter (that she won’t be able to really use until spring), and of course various and sundry other things.
For next year I’ve already floated the idea of taking a trip instead of gifts, and it was surprisingly well received. We’ll see.
Niceties and Nasties from New England 
We have the same problem. We have SO many relatives, and they get hand-me-down clothesand shoes from a number of sources, so I have to buy almost nothing. (Eventually we will become aware of the difference between “new” and “new to us” and that little piece of serenity will be gone.) And they have SO many toys. Last year I was able to clear out a lot of things they no longer played with to make room for Christmas stuff, but this year there isn’t nearly as much available for purging. As soon as I look at a toy and think, “oh, that could go,” one of them picks it up and plays with it for several hours a day. We’re doing things like adding to the Thomas train collection and the lego collection. And new books and puzzles. We’re going to see if grandparents will get some bedding items (DeBoy loves Cars and the Queen, not surprisingly, loves all things Princess). The Mountain Man’s company attorney takes his family on a trip every year instead of buying presents. They all love it.