Lack of Christmas tat might not be a bad thing?

[KingsleyShacklebolt]

News this morning about all those containers stuck at Felixstowe from Asia, and similar problems at ports in the US which are now working overnight to clear the backlog.

These aren't shipping containers with food, it's all the other toys, decorations and associated tat which line the shelves of supermarkets and places like Home Bargains earlier every year.

Maybe if people have a year where they can't buy tinsel, or a musical Santa which drops its trousers, or Christmas bedding, or elves on shelves, or any of the other crap, they will maybe realise that you can have a brilliant Christmas with last year's decorations, or homemade decorations, or charity shop decorations? Consumerism at Christmas has got WAY out of control and this might force a halt to the buy buy buy mentality, focused on single use plastic and cheaply made rubbish from China.

This sounds very judgemental to me. Maybe that 'tat' or elf on the shelf is important to a family, that £1 tinsel really brightens up their house.

I don't think having a hand-made paper chain means it's anymore loved or appreciated.

I hope so. I do sway to a minimalist Christmas although don’t have kids so it’s easier in many ways. I just have a tree, garland over the mantel, and one up the stairs. Don’t do office secret Santa’s, and just have one for family to keep costs down. In Jan I’m the one neighbours come to to borrow my spare wheely bin space. For me Christmas is about time, and remembering those not here anymore, rather than things or possessions.

Totally agree. I can't compute how busy all those shops are, people buying all that crap, the lights competition in every areas of town, even the poorest, with all the posts here about how people are struggling to buy healthy food and heat their house.

@starrynight87

This sounds very judgemental to me. Maybe that 'tat' or elf on the shelf is important to a family, that £1 tinsel really brightens up their house.

I don't think having a hand-made paper chain means it's anymore loved or appreciated.

I do judge!

I judge the people who change their christmas decoration colour scheme each year, and buy the tat like the aforementioned singing santa which drops its trousers.

There is just no point in banning carrier bags, straws, or buying a reusable water bottle to cut plastic usage when you buy ALL the plastic tat in Home Bargains (or similar) every year. It's superfluous. You do not need it.

One man’s tat is another man’s treasure! For me, Christmas is all about church and the religious aspects but I wouldn’t judge anyone who wanted something that means more to them.
(Though I could cheerfully slap whoever invented the stupid elf on the shelf tradition! Why do I always remember two minutes after I’ve got comfortable in bed?!)

Maybe that 'tat' or elf on the shelf is important to a family, that £1 tinsel really brightens up their house
Except that tat IS expensive. I was never into all that stuff (and Halloween and Easter...), too shocked at how expensive all the stuff is.

Totally agree OP and I judge too. You can have a great Christmas without tat. You can have a great birthday party without giving the kids plastic tat in party bags.

Plastic tat does not = happiness.

YANBU.

Most people have decorations, I know people who go out every year to buy a new plastic tree and plastic decorations and Chuck their one year old decorations in the bin.

Less landfill and better for the environment. Even those who are starting off new this year just moving into their first home can still pick up good decorations.

@starrynight87

This sounds very judgemental to me. Maybe that 'tat' or elf on the shelf is important to a family, that £1 tinsel really brightens up their house.

I don't think having a hand-made paper chain means it's anymore loved or appreciated.

It's not judgemental. We're killing the planet with all our tat.

I have to say I don’t much care for minimalist Christmas trees - the ones with half a dozen decorations and a string of lights casually arranged so they look like they’ve been thrown on. I’ve had most of my tree decorations for years though.

Absolutely. Most people have decs and whatnot already and could just reuse what they have. The amount of waste at Christmas is mind boggling. All this news about the cargo ships hammers home how the retailers want us to spend like crazy in this part of the year, all for a religious celebration that doesn’t even mean that much to a lot of us and if it does then blow up Santas probably don’t. We are being utterly manipulated to overconsume.

We replaced our previous artificial tree last year, it had lasted 20 odd years and was very threadbare as it had been a cheapy purchase. The one we've bought was quite an expensive one and I don't intend buying another one, ever.

Decorations are things we've had forever, none of it matches, some of it's handmade stuff the kids made, some charity shop, some bought new (usually in the sales). But then i'm not one for posting loads of pics of my tree online and i'm not particularly bothered about it all being beautifully designed.

If the stuff just isn't there to buy this year then it's a great way of resetting expectations and attitudes. You want new decorations? The swap with a friend, make your own, buy second-hand. There is enough plastic tat on the planet already without adding to that pile.

One thing I’m not down on is that we’ve seen that goods getting across world to us is huge and also that it’s not faceless

Speaking more of drivers now but as an easy order society - which has expanded hugely recently at least there’s a sense of what it takes and costs

We get sent two hampers by family every Xmas, that we don’t want. But DH won’t ask them to stop.
I hand it all on to people who eat that sort of stuff.
I’m definitely going for a smaller Xmas this year. Not buying all the food I usually do, and the kids are getting money with one or two things to open.

Completely agree OP.

Abominations like this would be the first on my list to go.

www.amazon.co.uk/Christmas-Decoration-Novelty-Bathroom-Festive/dp/B07L33TYZ1/ref=sr_1_9?dchild=1&crid=2OW5PXVLE13LA&keywords=christmas+toilet+seat+cover+set&tag=mumsnetforu03-21&qid=1634200529&sr=8-9

I add to our Christmas decs every year, but I don't how anything away, its just a very gradually growing collection. I imagine lots of people having their first Christmas in their own home would be disappointed if they couldn't get a few decorations. I don't mean Christmas would be ruined for them by any stretch, but it would be a shame. I just hope the availability of lovely locally and environmentally made decorations etc takes over so we don't have to rely on things travelling for miles.

Agree @GrandDuchessRomanov. If your Christmas is only complete with a santa loo cover, you have some issues to deal with.

I agree with you OP.

I agree absolutely on environmental grounds, OP. I also think it’s sad that people don’t seem to treasure their family Christmas decorations and bring them out each year.
I have some carved olive wood tree ornaments that a late aunt brought back from Bethlehem on her Holy Land pilgrimage decades ago, a Russian doll style santa bauble that I got in St Petersburg, some wonky decorations made by my DC (now in their thirties!) at Sunday school yonks ago, a carved wood bauble from the Oberammergau passion play… So many lovely memories as we decorate the tree each year. And each day in Dec, I still open the DC’s beautiful advent calendar sent by my sister 25 years ago.
For 20 years, our tree lights were the ones from my childhood home - I used them until they finally fused when my own DC were grown up.
Our tree may not be the latest designer chic, but it is full of love and memories of Christmases past. And as well as our main presents for family, instead of plastic tat stocking fillers, we get each other gifts like mosquito nets for Africa, a well for an Indian village, books for a literacy project etc.
It would be nice if, in the absence of plastic tat, more families this year rediscover what really matters about Christmas - the birth of Christ and the gift of love to the world.

Agreed, and I’d say the same for all the orange plastic Halloween tat, too.

Though having said that, I’m an appalling hypocrite, since I’ve bought a spooky light-up house for Gdcs from M&S (a fiver, but at least it’s not plastic), ditto some orange pumpkin fairy lights, also not plastic. And some glow in the dark Halloween balloons. 😩🎃

People decorating their homes is great.

But we have been conditioned to rely on bought plastic stuff to achieve that.

Honestly, we LOVED our paper chains as kids. And had fun that could not have been bettered if our home made hobby horse (a stuffed sock in a broom handle, with button eyes) had been a pink polyester and plastic unicorn.

There was plenty that I wouldn’t turn the clock back on, but a confidence in non-tat fun is a great strength to have!

Completely agree, OP. It's not about judgement, its about the environmental impact of all this plastic stuff at Christmas which is so wasteful. Stocking fillers, new decorations every year. Ok, the cheap plastic bits may have meaning as people don't want to feel they are going without and that is what they can afford but what about a culture of not needing so much, and not needing new so often? I hope this year will highlight the issue and mark a change.

edgeofthesky yes! It's about confidence not to need new at any cost to quality or the environment- thinking it's ok to buy secondhand, or use the same old decorations every year until they become much loved.

Should have added, but I hardly ever buy any new Christmas decorations except an occasional bauble. Ours have been accumulated over decades, some going back to when I was very small.

I used to have a very ‘stylish’ neighbour, who bought a whole new colour-themed set for her tree every year. So when she first asked me what colour tree we were having that year, I wondered what on earth she was on about and replied, ‘Er, green?’
(She often complained of being hard up, too.)

I'm not saying people don't need Christmas decorations. But most people will already have Christmas decorations. OK, they might be red and gold when the industry has decided that the "in" colours for this year are silver and purple or whatever but most people have something. Charity shops will have decorations, people will be selling unwanted baubles on Gumtree and at car boot sales.

What I'm saying is that what we DON'T need are the aisles and aisles of tat which appear in the shops around now, and are there until the end of December. Someone must be buying all this shit, and chucking loads away each January to buy new each autumn.

Also agree in the explosion of Halloween tat, and Valentine's tat, and Easter tat....