Christmas Day is just over four weeks away and I have not bought one Christmas present. Usually I’ve made some start with at least thinking about what to get people, but apart from what I might get my son I’ve done nothing.
My problem is I just don’t know what to get people. I’ve told one of my sister’s I don’t want bric-a-brac because I don’t want any more clutter. I hate the thought of just buying something for the sake of being Christmas Day. Somehow I don’t mind birthdays but at least that’s one person at a time and not so hard to deal with.
I sat down with JJ last week and we started writing out a Christmas list. He told me that he did not want a scooter. This was what I had been considering buying him. I swear he’s psychic. He conceded to let me put it on the list at least and that’s probably what I’ll get him as he does enjoy riding scooters.
Work has a random acts of kindness thing where you get a person and you perform three random acts of kindness. I’ve done this a couple of times but chose not to do it this year because I can’t even think what to do for my family, let alone someone I work with and might not even know that well.
I know I can’t ignore Christmas in the hope that it will go away and I think half of it is the expectation of what will happen on the actual day. I’m also sure just writing this stuff down will be the impetus for me to get off my bum and start doing something about the 25th of December. Once it’s all done I actually enjoy the gift giving thing, it’s just the lead-up that paralyses me.
So if anyone’s got any good gift ideas for parents and sisters please let me know.
I like the idea of random acts of kindness – much better than Secret Santa.
I am a great believer in making presents for grown ups…
Head over to Miscellaneous Mum. She’s got a Christmas fundraiser to purchase a well for a village in Cambodia. You can either buy a Christmas “well” donation for your family (there’s a lovely note there from someone who donated $40.00 on behalf/instead of her sister’s Christmas gift) or have a look at the Oxfam unwrapped range.
We buy cards from the Oxfam Unwrapped range and have them sent to our family members. For, ex, we give oxfam $13.00 to assist a single mother in Peru start a business, or $50.00 for an Aboriginal granny to help gather the community kids and teach them craft, etc, etc. Our loved on receives a card with a graphic of what their gift is doing for another person.
We’ve done it for years and it is particularly popular with the generation Y’ers.
Jen this is the direct link to Karen’s Well fundraiser: https://www.oxfamunwrapped.com.au/ViewFundraiser.php?id=4
I was just on her site to check how much she’d raised so far and noticed that the widget thingy in her side bar hadn’t loaded. Lucky I had the page linked to in our safety talk forum so I could easily and quickly get back to it.
I think I’m going to post some wonderful, inexpensive things I’ve found sometime this week. I have learned that convincing people to do online wishlists (even if it’s for stuff you’ll buy at a local store) is fantastic, because we can’t spend a lot of money (and we never seem to manage to follow through on that whole “next year we’ll save money for Christmas all year long” thing), and I am also not terribly creative. Perusing people’s wishlists not only gives you affordable gift ideas for them, but one person’s list can give you ideas for another person’s gift! And almost everyone has scads of inexpensive items…something they just wouldn’t get for themselves.
I’m digging the system at http://www.thethingsiwant.com at the moment.