Miranda, 52 retired nurse.
We had never been big on Christmas spending or Christmas celebrations when the kids were young, it was just never a big issue for us. The big thing in our year was the family holiday, now that was something we all got very excited about, and remember wonderful times and places and people.
Now that the kids have all grown and have their own little ones, we still don't bother with Christmas. For Neville and me, we just treat it as any other day. I know the kids have the big lunch at their in-laws and they have been at Nev and me to go to these for years. But I'm not interested.
We did try it one year, going over to Louise's where she had the whole lot of her in-laws, her husband’s parents, his brothers and a crowd of children. What a nightmare! It was full of noise, squabbles, too much food and booze. It really wasn't any fun for me & Nev so we left pretty early, didn't even stop for dessert.
We just let Louise know and we slipped out the door while the rest of them were bickering over who should do Christmas next year. We're well out of it.
I don't buy the grandkids anything for Christmas either. It doesn't make sense. I love all the children dearly, and they get enough junk at Christmas as it is. I just love them the same as always and spend as much time as I can with them. This is better for us all then to have us go spend lots of money buying stuff they don't need.
Louise's oldest boy. Jayden, who turned 8 last year, asked why we don't buy him a Christmas present. All the other kids at school get presents from their grandma & grandpa. I just said that this is something that we don't do, like we don't go water skiing, and we don't go to the opera.
He just said, Oh, ok. Nothing more was ever said. I do tell the children I love them, and spend time with them so they know we care. Buying presents at Christmas won't make me love them more.