Christmas - the MN way

[cathf]

When did it become a 'thing' to compete with others about how low-key/crap you make make Christmas? With added bonus points for ramming your self-styled ethical credentials down people's throats at every available opportunity?
There are loads of threads running at the moment, pulling apart others' festive traditions and indulging in one-upmanship in reverse.

A true MN Christmas must follow these rules, it seems:

1. No Elf on the Shelf they are vulgar and modern
2. No Christmas Eve Box - they are also vulgar and modern and no-one needs one pair of pyjamas a year, that is wasteful. CEB may be allowed if filled with twigs and leaves from the garden.
3. In extremis, an Advent calendar with pictures only MAY be allowed. No chocolate, certainly no present-type advent calendar. Although for some reason, Playmobil and Lego calendars seem to be permitted. A reverse advent calendar to collect food for foodbanks is certainly allowed, but only if you make sure everyone knows you are doing it.
4. Nothing that you usually use is permitted in a Christmas design - so absolutely no to Christmas duvets, towels and most especially festive-scented handwash. The fact that you would be buying eg handwash anyway is brushed over in a bluster of eco-virtue signalling.
5. Grandparents are not allowed to buy gifts, especially paternal grandparents. They need to be gently told that the children don't need anything but their time and attention. The children are absolutely fine with this .
6. Something you want (as long as it's wooden and sustainable), something you need (but no pyjamas - see above), something you use and something to read (we can all agree on this one - cue competitive bookworm comments)

Honestly, when did we become so joyless?

I feel duty-bound to caveat this with I won't be doing half of these things for various reasons but am I alone in getting fed up with reading the hierarchy of frugality from people who are convinced their way is the best way and everyone else must be shown how wrong they are?

I actually learnt about the EOTS and bought one as a result of MN 5/6 years ago. It was popular with MN then and a lot less common in the wider world, no one I knew had ever heard of it and thought I was weird. It’s only blown up over the past couple of years. Likewise Christmas bedding and Christmas Eve presents, I started those traditions after reading about them on here years ago and thinking it was a nice idea.

Oh, definitely, Leigh, if you're an adult it's not gift because all you want is 'tat' and you don't need it.

And if you buy a popular toy and then flog it on Ebay for profit you are Satan.

It's nit actually what the gift is, it's just the feeling that someone actually thought about me and bought me something. My siblings decided to do children only gifts one year when they all spent Christmas at mines. I got their children what they wanted and something for my dad.
Christmas morning they all got gifts from their children and spouses.
Dad got presents from them and his grandchildren.

I got fuck all.

*How on earth is it 'joyless' to love an old style Christmas that isn't spent tearing around crowded shopping centres, watching your kids barely look at one present before they're on to opening the next, before leaving half of them lying around unused and still in the box 6 months later, and putting the decorations up so early the novelty and excitement has long gone before Christmas day?

I don't buy into a lot of the excess of modern Christmasses. Bbut I get great joy from going to my niece's nativity play, attending our local candle lit carol concert, helping to produce the panto in the community hall, and making mince pies and Christmas cake Also from sitting around with my family enjoying a traditional Christmas dinner, getting lots of books for presents that I can curl up with on miserable January evenings and yes, giving presents in return but not making shopping the centre of Christmas*

But why are you being so extreme? I don’t know if anyone for whom Christmas is ONLY about shopping. Most people manage shopping and do all the things you describe (making Christmas cake, making dinner and going to a nativity are perfectly normal, populist things to do at Christmas!)

I will say that last year I had my nieces and nephews over and the present opening was an absolute frenzy, something I haven’t seen before, but actually who cares? It was over within 2 hours so we could carry on with the usual making dinner, going for a walk and watching the queens speech. All of that is perfectly normal and isn’t about “losing the meaning of Christmas” or being “excessive”

I wish EOAS had been invented when my sons were little.They and I would have loved it. Bit late to start now they are 45 and 47 and have their own homes.

And woe betide if you have traditions that are relatively eco- and pocket-friendly, because you re-use things year after year - because "where do you put the boxes"??

Mumsnet is a loft and wardrobe-free zone

I love Christmas but I feel as though people are starting it earlier and earlier every year. This weekend I saw no fewer than 3 posts on Facebook of peoples’ Christmas trees. I just don’t get it - surely it’s not special if it’s up for two months of the year?!

@picnicinnovember

Why is it 'mean spirited' to have views on the commericalisation of Christmas and new and expensive 'traditions' that don't co-incide with yours.

Please don't put words in my mouth. I didn't say it was mean spirited to have different views or traditions. I said that there have always been people that will criticize or put you down, long before social media became an anonymous forum, and that applies to every aspect, not just Christmas. Maybe you think being unnecessary critical and just plain nasty are good traits to possess, but I beg to differ.

OP, your post brought a smile to my face yesterday afternoon. I do see what you mean and I guess sometimes it can feel like people are heading to an extreme, but I do hope it was written a little in zest?

My main bug bear is unwanted, crap presents, so this year I'm cutting down a bit. A few family members only buying for my son, to stop the awful surprise presents from my MIL! I need to start a new thread on that alone!

But I most definitely will be getting pressies from hubbie and sometimes buy something for myself!

We do EOTS, my 5yo loves it. But no Christmas Eve boxes here, good for you if that's your thing.

I also enjoy the various Christmas trips and will also hope to visit Church at some point too. I enjoy connecting with the true meaning of Christmas and find it so peaceful and calming.

I couldn’t do the elf on the shelf. Even if i started off ok, I could never be bothered daily and it does seem a bit stupid to be honest.
I don’t want to get plastic crap (there will be an inevitable bit for my 3 yr old) but I’m loving spreading Christmas over a longer period with December 1st bags and small gifts on Christmas Eve!

I'm on the fence. We don't do the Elf (extra work? Are you mad?), but we do do PJs, a DVD and snacks on Christmas Eve as its fun, the kids then look less feral in my Christmas morning pics and I can get on with some Christmas day prep while everyone is occupied.

We do try to get them a bit of a pile of things to open, because DP has lovely memories associated with that feeling and wants to pass them on. I do always buy books, but that is more due to my own reading obsession than anything else. We go all out with food on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day, then back to normal.

Usually we go to DP's Mum for Christmas lunch, but as this year I'll be 38 weeks pregnant (and the older ones have all been a week or three early) we're staying at home. Grandparents can buy what they like for the DDs, it makes them happy, but we do kind of wish they would lay off the random tat for DP and I!

Before SM people did a lot less re Christmas and kept it to the tradition of mince pie, carrot etc on Christmas Eve, presents and big fuss on Christmas Day. But now everything has to be photographed and displayed. Lots of showing off and comparing, making some people feel like shit because they aren't able to do that much for their dc.

Bring back the old days is my opinion. Christmas actually felt special.

There are plenty of ways for people to take joy/create joy at Christmastime, there’s not an infinite supply of it. I’m just not getting why encouraging people to pause before just buying stuff for stuff’s sake is being joyless. It feels to me like the pressure to consume has us fast approaching a Whoville-Esq where Cindy-Lou Who is wondering if the meaning of Christmas (and not necessarily the religious meaning) has been lost somewhere along the way.

For quite a lot of people, feeling pressure to buy things (like new bedding/towels/whatever that you wouldn’t have otherwise bought) when they’re on a tight budget or are struggling financially. You see the threads on here of people asking “is this enough for a 6 year old??” Because they’ve spent all they can afford and are still worried it won’t match up to the pictures of piles of presents they see on their Facebook (which is why people think present pile photos are vulgar). Yes, it’s not very joyful to actually remind people of that, but that doesn’t mean that there’s no joy to be had doing things other ways.

But why are you being so extreme? I don’t know if anyone for whom Christmas is ONLY about shopping.

No, but for a lot of people shopping comes first and foremost. I heard someone at work complaining last year that she had to go to her child's nativity play on the Friday before Christmas and a bunch of her friends were meeting up that day for last minute shopping and a fancy lunch and she was wondering if she could 'get out of' going to the play.

I also hear so many people saying that they hate Christmas because of all the expense.

So shopping and spending money is beginning to take over from a lot of the other parts of Christmas.

There are various traditions I find weird and don’t do but I think more than anything it’s just I haven’t grown up with them.

The only ones I actively object to are:
Santa’s watching, you won’t get any presents! - it’s just such an appalling way to manage behaviour (i’m talking about parents who ACTUALLY use it before everyone jumps on me with ‘its only a joke’)
And
Christmas is about big piles of presents. - yes a big pile under the tree is lovely and I can see myself buying little cheap things to fill out the kids’ stockings but buying simply so that you have ‘lots’ is not only pointless but actually really annoying. My MIL does this and it means that we receive stacks of crap (if I sound ungrateful, well, I am. I don’t need crap) despite us politely telling her no gifts, giving gift ideas for each other/the kids and even specifically saying ‘please don’t buy any more bath sets they don’t get used’. Especially grating when she’s the one who cautions everyone about spending to much and how she won’t rwally be able to buy much this year!!