To hate bloody Christmas cards?

[HandbagsnGladrags]

I'm not a Christmas Grinch - I like Christmas. But AIBU to think that Christmas cards are a total waste of time and money? I fucking hate them. I wish no one would send them to me. They end up cluttering up the windowsills and making the house look untidy. I don't send any except to my bloody mother who makes a right fuss if I don't send her one. She also comments on my lack of card sending to others. Fuck off.

Is anyone with me?

I like receiving Christmas cards - agree with the pp who said they’re part of the Christmas decorations. I like postcards too, although I only ever get one from my dad these days.

A way of choosing to be in or out of sending them would be good. I hate to think of sending one only for it to provoke a grimace and be chucked straight in the bin.

Does anyone remember those massive fuck off cushioned cards that you used to get in boxes? Usually with a teddy on the front of them or something equally 🤮. They were even worse.

I’m with you OP although I do send them, if I don’t get a card back though I take the hint and don’t send one the next year. That way a few seem to drop off the list each year!

I don’t send any, though I do see the point if you’re not going to see the person.
What I find odd is when you do see someone around Christmas time and they also give you a card.

Yabu. It's a Christmas tradition. You can live with a less than perfectly ordered house to keep the Christmas spirit.

I bet they hope their friends cotton on too!

It doesn't make me a Scrooge to hate cards. If I don't give you one, please for the love of God get the hint!

I have. This person is a new friend she didn't know. If people want to waste their money it's up to them? Service users have learning disabilities so they're allowed and get them in return.

Not allowed opinions then? I'm waiting for surgery and picking up the fucking stupid things off the floor after the cats knocked them off, physically hurts me... Hating then doesn't make me a Grinch. HTH

None sent or received here anymore. What a flippin chore it was with a boring old generic message for people you wouldn't see from one end of the year to the next. Glad that's gone.

However, I have kept three special cards and put them on the mantlepiece every year. One from Mum and Dad, one from Mum after Dad died, and one from my dear sister who died at 49. A little battery candle goes in front of them. Gives me pleasure, makes me sad, but I like to remember them, and it's a personal thing.

Love sending and receiving them, as all my friends do

Thankfully, nearly all of our friends have cottoned on and no longer send cards. It will have died out completely in about 5-10 years, I reckon.

I mostly stopped sending them years ago and these days only write them to my mother and sister as we don't see each other on Christmas Day.

DH wanted us to continue sending them to all of his enormous wider family (dozens of them ) and swore blind that he would take it on himself. Needless to say he hardly ever got around to sending any, but at least it no longer falls on me. Fuck that.

I do display the few that we still receive, but thankfully it is a dwindling number. The children are now also grown up so no need to get boxes for them to send to hundreds of others either.

I used to like getting cards but the past few years I've definitely viewed them more as clutter. I've also sent much less the past few years as the cost is so high and I also know lots of other people don't like them.
My mum's side of the family bloody love a card so they all get one and both of my grannies always get millions of cards and they love them.

It definitely is a waste really if it's just "merry Christmas from x". I try to write a nice message/give a bit of an update on our little boys but as I said, I am sending much less. Maybe 10 max.

I'm pretty sure baby class teachers won't think of your cards as keepsakes! Friends probably won't and debatable whether family will!

Don’t underestimate what a card and letter mean to elderly people, my annual card and letters have actually been mentioned as giving a great deal of pleasure at the last three family funerals I have attended. I still keep in touch with an elderly neighbour who is almost 104, she moved away 10 years ago, and her daughter actually wrote and thanked me after Christmas last year for keeping in touch.

Don’t send them if you don’t want to, but for people who don’t get out much and don’t have social media they can mean a lot.

They are a waste of time, paper and resources.
They are wifework also.

Xmas I agree with you and am with same age as you with a mother 90 too.... I get a lot of pleasure in sending and receiving cards, I don't bother with Social Media etc so it is a lovely way of keeping in touch with people. My mother feels the same .. she also keeps in touch with many old school friends.

And many people do keep the photos of children that are sent over the years, I would only send a photo to relatives, Godparents etc but when clearing out an elderly aunt's home recently she had kept all my son's school photos ...carefully labelled .

I work for a charity and we still sell huge quantities of cards each year so clearly many people do continue to enjoy sending and receiving cards.

I did think that. The only people who would view them as a keepsake are the parents and the grandparents. No one else cares

Mavis speak for yourself, my DH is sitting opposite me writing cards to all his family and friends. . And of course he bought and chose his own.

I radically disagree, OP. I think you and I are from different planets.

Christmas cards can be beautiful with lovely artwork and they are one of my favourite things about Christmas. I love hearing them fall on the mat, going to open the envelopes and find out who's sent them and arranging them on my bookshelves*. They actually constitute a major part of my Christmas decs - don't go in for much otherwise.

Of course - I wouldn't argue with anyone who said that there are some naff ones around - by far the majority. But I have my own designs (prints and painting) printed and it costs less than buying them. I post relatively few, to older people who really appreciate them and to friends - and all my friends give them.

I don't know how you can think of them as clutter! But - different strokes.

• I admit the naff cutesy ones go up at the top where they can't really be seen!

I like them, I put them on a string across a wall or picture rail so they don't fall over every time there's a draught.

I'd rather not waste my time and money sending one to someone who just bins it instantly though, and I make a note if someone sends a card saying "we're not doing Christmas cards after this year". If someone on my list doesn't send us one then I note that and don't bother next time, in case they just want to quit doing it.

I have old Christmas cards from people who are no longer with us, as well as my FIL's collection of cards that he and his mum used to send each other back in the 1940s onwards. The changing styles and designs is quite interesting to me.

I only give Christmas cards to my elderly mother in law - she loves a Christmas card especially from her grandchildren. The cost of individual Christmas cards and stamps put me off now.

I'm with you. I think it's just a waste of money for something that ends up in the bin. My Mum also gets on at me about it, she is the only person I buy a card for. Even my 10 Yr old refuses to write cards out.

Pointless and a waste of money. I'm absolutely with you.

I would like one with a picture of our grandchildren on which I would keep but I definitely wouldn't be keeping one of anyone else's dc.
I send one to Dh, our elderly parents, one to sil bil and my sister and husband. That's it. I stopped sending any others years ago.
I hate birthday cards too, they're all a waste of money, trees and stamps.