My favorite holiday is officially over.
Did you get lots of candy?
Since Halloween is now officially a year away, Christmas is just a hop, skip, and a jump [or maybe a flake, sneeze, and a carol] away.
Scary thought, huh?
With this gift laden holiday quickly approaching, I find myself remembering last Christmas.
Tucker, Cara and I were at home in Arkansas. It was Christmas morning and we were staying with my in-laws.
Everyone was sitting around the Christmas tree and presents were stacked in neat piles in front of everyone.
Tucker and I unwrapped our gifts from each other and while I was shredding wrapping paper, I noticed that my sister-in-law and her husband hadn’t exchanged gifts.
Odd, I had thought.
But, I was so excited by my perfect present from Tucker that I forgot about their lack of gifts.
It wasn’t until several days later that I learned from my mother-in-law that my sister-in-law and husband do not give each other gifts. Instead, they tithe their church and buy presents for “needy” people.
[I had just gotten Tucker a $300 satellite radio…imagine how great my mother-in-law’s news made me feel.]
Anyway, last Christmas has gotten me to thinking about presents and gift giving.
Are we [Tucker and I] “bad” people because we buy each other gifts?
Do you buy presents for your spouse or do you do like my sister-in-law and her husband?
by A. Tucker
[tags]Christmas, holidays, presents, gift giving, charity, deep thoughts, tithing, judging, guilt[/tags]
Photo graciously provided by something.in.my.eye, through a Creative Commons license, some rights reserved
4 responses so far ↓
SJ // Nov 1, 2007 at 6:57 am
Hmm, we don’t do either - in my family we generally only give gifts to the kids, so once we had one, we have pretty much stopped giving each other gifts. I do like the idea of charity.
But then, most big things we want we will just decide on together and save for together anyway, not as gifts. Or we will splurge on an experience (weekend away, nice dinner out) rather than gifts.
This year my bro-in-law and his wife have a new baby and we’ve agreed only gifts for the kiddos (in past years we’ve bought presents for them and vice versa but it mostly just seems like none of us need more stuff…)
AmyL // Nov 1, 2007 at 11:35 am
Tere // Nov 1, 2007 at 12:02 pm
We do both. We have a small budget with which to give each other a little something, and we also budget for an imaginary extra child - for whom we buy gifts (I always stick with classics like coloring books, cards, jacks, dolls, cars) and donate those to a charity that collects for underprivileged kids.
kathylynn // Dec 14, 2007 at 11:41 am
I think after reading this story I am going to donate to a needy family instead. What a wonderful feeling it will be.
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