@ExConstance
This thread sort of makes me sad. I love Christmas, we are comfortably off and give money to charity too but I just love getting very carefully chosen presents for my family ( why are presents always called "Tat" on Mumsnet?) I learned from my mother to listen carefully all year and work out what people wanted or wished for. It might be soething little, like a blue plant to go in the border with the pink ones or a pear tree because they only had apple ones, or an ice cream scoop for someone who she had seen struggle with a spoon week in week out. It might be a big bottle of someones favourite perfume when i'd noticed they were nearly out. I can see the point of not giving if it isn't wanted by most of us don't buy ourselves little luxuries or even necessities we would like to have and the secret of good present giving is to get these.
I will be sending cards, i love getting them, sending them, writing little notes to go in them and displaying them in my home. I'll be spoiling my adult sons with nice presents. There will be no tat! When all the decorations go back in the box on 5 January (yes, I make it last the full 12 days) I'll be a bit sad and start thinking about next year. I'm very aware there are other views on this but don't brand all of us Christmas lovers as unwanted tat merchants please!
But this is exactly how Christmas should be! I love it, and I make it last until Twelfth Night too. I think a winter rest is a really important thing for health - twelve days of relaxing, being at peace, enjoying doing nothing, going for long walks and eating rich food. It's different from a holiday where you might have to go sightseeing, and the exhaustion of plane travel etc.
During the twelve days I catch up with friends and family, maybe go out for a knees up on New Year's Eve, cook fancy meals we don't normally have time for. My husband and I plan things to do just like we would for a summer holiday, but they're restorative activities, rather than exciting or interesting.
I love sending and receiving cards, and as I said upthread I think gift giving is a very important part of human social interaction when it's done right (like you've described here). I also love the rituals of putting my tree up (which has decorations I've collected for years, including inherited ones that are older than me) and taking it down. I love decorating using symbolic greenery, it makes me feel connected to human history, as well as my own childhood.
What I cannot stand is the way commercial nonsense is being forcibly marketed as Essential Christmas Tradition. The John Lewis ad, Christmas boxes, expensive advent calendars, cheap Christmas-themed clothes. I generally manage to avoid it all by not being on social media and not watching much linear TV.