I'm going to treat you all to my unpopular Christmas opinion.

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You CAN send Christmas cards AND donate money to charity. Anyone who says they're not sending cards so they can donate the money to charity is just a Scrooge.

What are your unpopular Christmas opinions? Share here.

There's Christmas charity ecards. Like oxfam.

I make gift labels by cutting nice images out of the old cards

will think I am a proper Scrooge, DH, DC and I no longer waste a tenner each on special DC, sibling and spouse cards. Father Christmas can put THAT in his pipe and smoke it

This is a thing? I have never heard of it. I have never recieved or given such a card. It would never occur to me to send dc or dh a card.

Actually, mil does it thinking about it but I thought that was just her and her love of twee “tatty teddy” shite with elaborate verses and cards with pages. She does it for birthdays too.

My rule of thumb is if I don’t see someone regularly, or they’re an elderly aunt who likes that sort of thing, i send a card. Usually about 5 in total. Anything else is a waste of paper.

Please send your Dad’s address. I would love to send him a card. I have elderly parents, fortunately in good health, and they so enjoy receiving and sending cards. I hate the mean spirited attitude about sending cards which to me seems laziness not wanting to genuinely give to charity!
Happy Christmas.
A fellow Mumsnetter.

I love sending and receiving cards, I love receding charity gifts but despite clearly asking for them I never receive them, so buy them for myself now .

For your roast potatoes...don't heat the oil.

Par boil potatoes, let them steam dry...then put in tray. Add the oil straight from the bottle.

They come out so much more crispy.

I'm not really into Christmas, have no Xmas decorations, no Xmas tree and have already told my 2 year old Santa isn't real, the only things we do do are Xmas presents and have Xmas dinner at my parents house because it's tradition

That is so sad. The most magical memories from my childhood are of christmas, and my parents didn't have much money either so it wasn't about all the presents etc.

BIL and SIL now don't buy "for the adults" because christmas is "all about the children and there are so many of them". They have one DD. DSIL's side of the family have several children. DBIL's side of the family (eg, ours) only have their DD and our DS .

I think it's stingy tbh, they're minted.

Here's a really unpopular one actually - I don't like my roast potatoes crispy!

My GBF has amused me no end by going to a Carol Service and raging that God kept being mentioned because, "Christmas is about Coca Cola and presents" He's fantastic.

reallyanotherone
Special family cards are a very working class thing I think.
My mum would be appalled if I didn’t buy her a mum card with an appropriate twee verse and she always stands over me when I open my ‘daughter’ card from her to make sure I’ve properly read and digested the messages in my card. She will then quiz me on whether or not I like said card and message many times

Sorry, CBA to RTFT of moaning, but all I heard when I read your title were the words of Brenda from Bristol
“What, anotherrrr one?”

Special family cards are a very working class thing I think.
My mum would be appalled if I didn’t buy her a mum card with an appropriate twee verse and she always stands over me when I open my ‘daughter’ card from her to make sure I’ve properly read and digested the messages in my card. She will then quiz me on whether or not I like said card and message many times

This is my mum too. Gotta get that 'mum' card, but my mum also has delusions of middle classness, so it's all the better if it's William Morris/Charles Rennie McIntosh inspired.

SnuggyBuggy - dsis is hoarding Christmas cards because each year the number reduces (natural wastage (!) and those who are "donating to charity").

Mark my words, some time in the future the Christmas card will be a sought-after item on ebay. As it is I wish I still had some of the 70s ones featuring stagecoaches and - gasp - religious scenes . I've had it with ironic.

I have to tell the truth culled a few previous card recipients; if someone doesn't send me one for a couple of years then they're off the list. But, not to send an elderly relative a card is mean and lazy.

I'd just hope no one notices it's the same cards every year

I don't get the charity thing unless you genuinely have so little disposable income that you can't afford both some cheap cards and stamps and a charity donation. It just seems like wanky virtue signalling to me.

Die Hard is not a Christmas film.

Shaking Stevens made the best Christmas song of all time.

I send so few cards that I’m down to the ones in my stockpile that say they can be recycled in store in January 2009

I think it's stingy tbh, they're minted

Just because they are, doesn't mean everyone they are giving to is. I think they have the right idea. Christmas is ridiculously over commercialised. What is the point in me spending money on something you don't need for you to spend money on something I don't need?

Generally I have always found Christmas gifts to be underwhelming, despite trying to find things that others would love. (rub it in with a single mug and coaster set, the first year I am living alone, for example, or an offensive 'humerous' book about going through the menopause).

So I guess my unpopular opinion is that we should forget about sending overpriced tat to each other, and instead spend time with each other.

I'm so grateful to my parents that we never went to pantos as kids, or visited Santa in his grotto. Panto is excruciatingly awful, everything i hate about notions of 'entertainment', I'm never taking our kids!

Visiting Santa sounds nice but I would've been baffled/ shy as a child and now I have kids myself I don't fancy answering any suspicious questions! Or queuing for hours

The amount of people missing the point of this thread. 😂 This isn't a thread about Christmas cards specifically. That was just an example to get conversation flowing.

I agree with the OP. the money spent on cards is minor compared with the effort, and it affirms social bonds. you may not be willing to sacrifice a weekend to visit your cousins but you can at least spend 30 seconds communicating with them as individuals rather than members of an email address book.

Mash potato is superior to roast potatoes.

Tinsel is long rustly litter.
Turkey is dull.
Christmas music was invented by the devil, and Noddy Holder, as a torture device for us poor retail workers.

ah. I get you. it's a thread for unpopular opinions about Christmas in general.

mine - Christmas lunch shouldn't be at lunchtime. there should be a big breakfast that you feel full from till about 3pm then you should snack on nuts and chocolate till at least 5pm when the main meal can happen.

The Queen's Speech makes me sick.

it is still Christmas on 5th January. There are 12 days of Christmas. do not arrive in the office on the first business day after new year and start taking down the decorations.

People with lots of mismatched and tatty Christmas decks, and an eye sore of a tree. Is it that difficult to have something nice?

Why does everything have to be about the children? Why does everything have to be about it being great for them; what happened to telling children you can't touch that and reinforcing it?

Sorry, I'm just sour. In laws are on at me that I don't do enough tat for my DC.

I always had a perfectly themed and lovely looking tree and decs growing up. I thought it was all so magical. The tree always looked great and I always got to help.

Doesn't mean you need to add unsightly tat