This year our family is doing "acts of kindness" for each other in lieu of gifts. This is a tradition that we started last year. My parents loved my husband's and my acts so much last year that they asked us to repeat them this year. :)
Additionally, we help host holiday parties in rehab centers, youth detention centers and jails with an organization my mother is involved with. This includes cake, some gifts (depending on what is allowed) music and a general party atmosphere.

My sister-in-law is out of work, and I'm not exactly rich, so this year we decided just to buy presents for the kids young enough to still believe in Santa Claus. All the rest of us understand that material things are not what makes the season. We can still be together, make homemade gifts, cook, and enjoy each other.

Although I wish things weren't so hard for so many people, I'm actually glad that the economy is making people re-assess their values on this front. And charity donations are the best gifts to give those "people who have everything" on your list.

We were just talking about this topic this morning! We have fallen in love with the idea of donating to Heifer International, a charity who gives animals to families in 3rd world countries so they can get eggs, milk, fiber, etc. They're actually on the BBB.com site, which is pretty remarkable and transparent for a charity.

Please remember that the needs are just as great all year round. It seems like everyone who can gives at Christmas. What are you doing the rest of the year? That's what I would like you to think about.

My entire extended family has decided to give to Heifer International as well. Each of us is donating what we can to a family pool to buy as many goats as possible in lieu of gifts for each other. The young children will still receive small gifts and candy in their stockings, and we're all looking forward to a nice family dinner together. I just wish we had started a tradition like this earlier, the holiday season is so much more pleasant when not spent in a crowded store.

lovely and timely post. i am so very sick and tired of the whole shopping aspect of christmas. several years ago we opted out of presents and it is amazing how much better it makes the holidays.

whenever i tell people this they look at me wistfully as if they, too, wished they could opt out but it was just too difficult. i agree with meechelle - the poor economic climate is a good time to reassess what is important.

that's what life ought to be about: family, food, helping those less fortunate, and not a mad rush to buy cheap junk that will be discarded within a fortnight.

Yes Gettingthere, people do need hoelp year round. However, there is something important about making people feel special this time of year. It isn't unique to family's who traditionally have things, but also to those with very little. Consequently, it is extra important to make an impact right now. Absolutely people should be inclined to do more yaer round, but chastize or even simply judging those who opt to take action this time of year is not appropriate.

No more STUFF in our house. Nor are we buying stuff for others. I have started cleaning out old Christmas Spode dishes and will fill them with goodies and give as gifts.

I agree with the polish chick. I'm extremely fortunate to have a roof over my head, being gainfully employed, and having family and friends to love. The last three years we have opted out of giving and receiving presents and it feels so much better to adopt a family in need or donate to a worthy cause, or volunteer.

Gettingthere, I agree, the needs are great year around and it's nice to see myself and other people volunteering and donating to the various causes.

Gettingthere one thing to note is that many non-profits (assuming you are giving thru 501(c)3's) budget for a full year and if they get a lot of individual donations they assume that comes in at the end of the year, for tax purposes of course. It is better to give at the end of the year than not at all. And it is rarely going to make or break a non-profit to give on Dec 10th instead of July 10th. Cash luckily doesn't have an expiration on it (vs say blood which you really should donate year round because it does). Most nonprofits are really strapped right now (I've seen a lot of friends and colleagues laid off in the last few months) but as long as you give the full amount you are able to each year when won't usually matter too much.

I too am sick of the commercial side of christmas. This is a nice and appropriate post. The current economy should be giving people an eye opener as to what is really important in life...and its definately not stuff.

Last year we reduced what we bought for everyone and this year we are not buying. Basically, we're completely over the commercialism of xmas and would rather celebrate it as time spent with family and giving to those in need.

I've expressed this to my parents and they completely understand. My in-laws, however, freaked out when a member of their family sent out an email about how they didn't want gifts for them or their child because they were teaching her what they believe the true meaning of xmas to be. This was a mean and cheap thing to do according to the in-laws, so I'm still waiting for my husband to tell them we've adopted the same ideal this year and it will be our tradition to refrain from gift giving and donate time and what little money we have to help others during the holidays. We're already too unconventional for their tastes, so this is just something to add to the list. Oh well.

Glad to see there are others who are adopting a new way of celebrating this year, makes me feel like less of a grinch!

One of the things my family does is sit down together and write notes to businesses indicating employees who have given us great service over the year. So often companies receive complaints about employees, but few compliments.

That's an odd picture to use for a post about cutting back. Are those Manolos, Choos, or Laboutins on the carpet, next to the $1500 Rotor coffee table?

We are not giving material gifts or givng simple, modest gifts. For me, it is by choice - along all the lines expressed above. For my partner, it is by necessity. He is quite unhappy about it, though, and resents it - feels he is being cheap and stingy - but he is just plain old flat broke... Maybe the experience of it all being okay will soften it for him.

I've never really participated in traditional gift-giving in my family. I'm a big believer in giving "needed" gifts if anything at all. Not just random gifts that will be forgotten in a few days. I've just never been attracted to the stress of xmas shopping so that gainfully employed adults can have more crap to collect dust. My partner, however, doesn't get it and is demanding a wii as a xmas gift.

dkallas that is so great. I spent 34 years in customer service and was always thinking the same. Everyone calls or writes about bad service, but what about good? I was lucky to receive many letters of thanks and now I pass them on when I receive great service.

Fourteen years ago I started giving donations to animal shelters in friends' names as a gift, and asking them to do the same.

Though we have always provided Christmas for a family in need, we used to also have a big Christmas for ourselves. We have significantly cut back on the amount of gifts we give over the past several years, and now tend to give only small gifts or donations-in-name-of to the adults. The children still receive gifts, but those are limited to three or four (including gifts from grandparents) as opposed to the 15 or 18 gifts they each used to receive.

Good observation, Patrick. But there are no PRESENTS. We're trying to feel good about not being *those* kind of people here :)

Last year my ever-extending extended family decided to choose names. It is wonderful. Adults get assigned an adult and kids get a kid.

I actually use Christmas as a way to get handcrafted stuff that I would never buy myself, but would love to have. I also encourage my mother-in-law (who always wants to drop a presents bomb on my daughter) to buy handmade quality over plastic quantity. This year I suggested felt play food.

I love presents - buying them, giving them, opening them, watching other people open them... The family has cut back a bit this year, but that just means I have more money for presents for the domestic violence shelter. I split my funds between toys, and the practical things on their wish list (like deodorant and laundry baskets).

Sugarbakers--

:)

lemonadefish--

Thanks for the reminder that presents aren't, all on their own, inherently evil. And that the real joy belongs to the giver, not the recipient. You get it.

What a nice idea to give another family the presents.

In our family, we exchange gifts, but they've never been elaborate, expensive ones. It's usually books or music or movies we think the other person will enjoy.

I agree 100% with this post. I think we are opting to focus on family and being together rather than buying gifts after gifts. It's been a tough year with some loses and some joys and just to finally wrap up the year as a family is really such a gift in itself.

Unfortunately Jesus Christ has become the patron saint of shop keepers in the UK. Christmas has become so commercial it's sickening, and I'm an atheist. I enjoy celebrating different cultures and beliefs and see Christmas as a time to be with family and to do nice things for other people.

We visit the old lady who sold us our house, over Christmas as she has no family. We give our time to charities, make donations and old clothing etc to charity shops.

I'm not against giving presents, I love giving and receiving them. Just don't like over the top greedy. My brother in law is getting a flat screen tv from his brother in law. I'm sure it's just being done to be seen.

our family has, for the past 5 years, decided to give gifts only to the kids. all the other money we would have spent on gifts for family is donated the the charity of the givers choice. we'll be doing this again this year. we share, at our holiday gathering, what charity we've given to, and what the charity does.

I enjoy exchanging gifts with friends and family. Its fun to surprise someone with a thoughtful gift or be treated to something you wouldn't neccessarily have bought for yourself. I kind of resent when people try to make Christmas be just about the kids... its fun for adults too! I also like the idea of giving to charity and helping others, but I don't think I'd ever want to give up presents entirely!

@rebeldress I have the same problem with my boyfriend's family. I've even said I would still buy for others people, but requested that people either don't get me anything or donate whatever they'd have spent on gifts. But apparently, that just makes me "difficult."

We scheduled our yearly vacation for the week after Christmas. I tried to convince my family to do family get togethers (I suggested we do "event planner" for each other, and each family unit would plan one event for everyone), but was voted down in favor of Secret Santa. My in-laws, on the other hand, together decided we'd all just exchange baked good. They rock.

Sigh.

Maybe next year.

But they can't stop me from finishing and illustrating the kids' story that I'm giving my nieces and nephews for a gift! :) Homegrown storytime!

We told our families last year and this year that we don't want gifts, instead they should donate to a charity that we pick. For some reason I have yet to figure out they don't quite understand and still insist on buying us things. This year I might just try to return everything and get cash back to donate ;-)

I love giving as well as receiving gifts and in our family, thankfully we usually give practical gifts, or gifts that may NOT be practical, but know the other person will get a kick out of it anyway or can enjoy hanging on their wall or listening to etc.

I've been known to give out handmade CD's of stuff that have significance to the family, like one year, I made a copy of an old Firestone presents LP of Julie Andrews singing traditionial Christmas Carols from the 1960's to my 3 older siblings and my Mom and in there, gave them all a copy of my middle sister in the Adelphian Choir that she was in during college that was made in 1976 that my parents bought at the time, and that was the year my sister and the choir went to England and Scotland on tour. I not only transferred it to CD, but re-created the artwork and printed the CD label with a photo of the actual album label that I photographed and doctored up in Photoshop, the artwork were all photographed and again, doctored up in Photoshop and then printed using the label software that comes with the CD buring software.

When I DO buy stuff, I put a lot of thought and effort into it and by buying what I KNOW they want and/or need. One year, 2 of my neices wanted clock radios so I went hither and yon to find 2 clock radios that looked decent, not big, were easy to tune in (many cheap clock radios had small dials and thus were hard to tune in), controls and switched well placed and labeled (again, many cheap radios fail big time in both areas), sounded decent enough for clock radios, were easy to set and didn't cost much more then $15, I found TWO of them, one a GE, forget what the other one was, both fit virtually all of my criterias and both didn't cost over $12 each both came from different sources. I believe they appreciated the thought that went into them but both were still in either grade school or Jr High and thus didn't have the knowledge to understand such efforts. But it was fun to do non the less.

I like my gifts to be useful, things I'd probably not buy myself or things I need like I have been known to ask for socks or underwear as I knew I needed some and thought if I didn't get any for Christmas (usually I did) I'd then get them afterwards or ask for an art easil, (it's on my list this year) and gave mention of one by Ultrecht, cost ($40) etc and if I don't get it, I'll buy it.

When my Dad was alive, he gave me some fabulous things like a couple of record players and in the 8th grade, a new stereo, true, I'd spotted it and we went halfies on it, it was a refurbished Hitachi all in one unit w/ a BSR record changer and a cassette recorder w/ 2 full range speakers, he gave me a new TV (a 12" B&W) after the last second hand one I had was just too big for the room even if it worked great still for a 20 YO set. He did so due to wanting me to have all the opportunities possible as I grew up w/ hearing deficiencies (can hear but it's not great). So I appreciate the thought as much as anything that goes into buying the gift as much as the gift itself and thus have good memories now of many of the best ones.

The best thing about it for me is that rarely were gifts some old useless utensil that I'd never use or would appreciate but in the end, it's less about quantity, rather than the quality of the gift.

This year as in years past, most of the gift giving was centered around the imediate family of the person, for me, it's Mom and whomever we spend Christmas with (in this case my youngest sister and her family) so my gift giving is for her and them and since I will be at the family gathering on the 26th, I got assigned my oldest sister to give and all other members of the family are optional and if we do, we give them theirs afterwords.

In a way, that takes some of the pressure off to get EVERYONE something but my great nephew will be getting 4 CD's I've made of old children's albums.

Looking back, I forgot to mention the stereo was purchased in 1978, the TV was given to me in I think 1981 while in High school.

My family has given to Heifer International for years, and been really happy with that as our big ticket item (it's a great teaching opportunity if you have kids in your family), gifts to each other have to be small - thoughtful - whether it's the favorite book I read this year, music, or a poem written in your honor.

This year, I'm giving both Heifer and to local charities, maximizing my companies matching contribution for local charities (food bank, etc). I'm also gifting homemade food items, pear brandy (I tied bottles on the pear tree to make French style pear brandy with the pear grown inside the bottle), pear fruitcake, homemade cookies and chocolates. So there are still presents under the tree but very few storebought (even those are very specific - books & music).

I volunteered at the food bank this year, bagging produce, and had quite an eye opener when 2 days later I saw the food bank's truck in my neighborhood with a very long line of people waiting patiently for food. So my small Christmas bonus went to the food bank, and was matched by my company, and knowing that'll feed 5 or more families for the entire month is just about the best holiday gift I could give or get.

I love presents, not going to deny it, sorry for breaking the anti-gift party

I make rag dolls and other plushies and give them to different communities with children in need during Christmas