OK, I've spoken to DH about this and he was no help so I'm going to ask you lot and hope she's not a MNetter!!
Here's the problem...
Last year, a group of other mum's and I that I know from Antenatal lessons (our children are now nearly 3) decided that we would do a Secret Santa between us.
We all wanted to buy each other and the children a gift and were aware that buying 4 lots of gifts for adults and another 4 lots for the children would a) be expensive and b) leave us with houses full of little toys when we already had loads. Secret Santa meant we only had to buy 1 adult gift and 1 child gift so we could spend a little more on each and get something a bit nicer.
So, budgets were set, names were drawn out of a hat and everything went well. So well, we decided to do it again this year.
But, this year the children are older and don't all want to do the same activities and most are in nursery a few days a week. Because of this, the opportunities for getting us all together at once happen quite infrequenty - I'll see maybe 2 mums at one place, 1 or 2 more somewhere else but never all at once very often. This made doing the draw from the hat hard so we decided that I would organise it and get my DS to draw the names. Yes, I would know who everyone had but I didn't mind (partially happened last year too when I ended up drawing myself and had to swap with someone!)and everyone else would still be 'in the dark' Plus, my baby brain (I'm 33 weeks pregnant) is so bad at the moment, I've already forgotten who had who!!
So we did this yesterday and I texted everyone individually with who they'd drawn to buy for. All done and everyone happy I thought.
But, 1 friend is at Center Parcs this week. When she did reply, after the draw, she said that as it wasn't secret now, the whole thing seems kind of pointless. I replied immediately and said that it was only not secret to me and I didn't mind if she didn't but she didn't reply. It may be worth pointing out at this point that she had drawn me and DS to buy for.
Later on that evening, she changed her Facebook status from her phone to say that she needed someone to tell her about the meaning of giving and receiving gifts at Christmas as she seems to have gotten it wrong. I am guessing this must be related to our Secret Santa as how many Christmas present related issues can she be having during a week at CP?
She hasn't texted me back so I have no idea if she wants to change it all or is just disappointed with the way it's been done. If we need to change it, I need to know soon as I was planning to go shopping today but I don't want to text her to ask as I can't work out how to do it without sounding stroppy.
So, what do I do? DH says ignore her as everyone else is happy but I hate people being cross at me and want to make it better. I'm thinking of telling her to buy the Mum and Child I drew a present and removing me and DS from the Secret Santa. That way, it doesn't matter if I know who's got who as I'm not involved, it's a secret for everyone buying. I would feel a little sorry for DS being left out but I could always spend the £10 I was going to use to buy the gift for the child on something for him so he doesn't know?
I know we could organise a get together and redraw it but that could take a couple of weeks and I wanted to finish my Christmas shopping today (I went for a short trip 2 weeks ago and was in agony for 2 days after with some SPD type pain so I wanted this to be the last trip) plus, I'm due to go to CP in 2 weeks too and when I get back, it'll be December and I'll be 37 weeks pregnant and won't want to go shopping! It'll be too late to reliably get something from the internet and there is no way DH would shop for me, he hates it! I have no idea what to get either and I like looking at real thing when I'm not sure.
So, what do I do to fix this and come out looking like I've dealt with it in an adult way? Any help would be appreciated!
Oh, and yes, there is no way I'm volunteering to organise it next year!
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Secret Santa issues - Help please
19 replies
GoldenSnitch · 12/11/2009 08:22
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