Is it miserable to say no presents for or from in laws

[QueenStevie]

I'm toying with the idea of saying to MIL let's just not exchange presents this year. She is already asking what we want and trying to suggest things that we might want as a joint present when, in reality, I'm saving up for a nice £££ handbag and I wouldn't mind money towards that and DH wants money for his geek hobby. So they will end up giving us some money in an envelope and I will end up getting them a voucher for a meal out or something similar. It just seems unnecessary. They could keep their money to buy something they want and we could keep our money to put towards what we want. But will that be really miserable on Christmas day? I don't want to feel like the Grinch!

@Bambamhoohoo thats it exactly.
Swapping gifts can be a total drag.
It sucks the joy out of Christmas. Trying to come up with ideas. Buying, wrapping, faking oh thats lovely, trying to exchange or cart to charity shop!

I'd happily go to a token box of chocolates.

Edit and I'll add a total waste of money.

Plus the constant- from October - what do you want? What do your children want? Any ideas for your husband? FUCK OFF

It absolutely does my head in.
The kids end up with far to much stuff it hardly gets looked at.

We do Secret Santa, max £20. None of us need more stuff, so it’s just for fun and how creative you can be for £20.

I love gift giving with my parents and siblings but we stick to around £20-£30 so something like a book and a bar of chocolate. It's not a strict money limit so a nice gin or whisky for those who like them at £40ish ok too. We often choose fancy coffee or tea or other 'consumables' and they last through winter.

That's Great.

We now do a family secret santa for adults..£50 limit. We all make suggestions of what we would like or if we would like a surprise. It all gets wrapped in brown paper and put in a sack on arrival at the door.

We are all adults in our family now and we do a Secret Santa type thing in the last few years. We set a fixed budget, anywhere between 50 or 100 quid depending on how flush the poorest person in the family is that year. Names are pulled out of a hat or using an app. No-one finds out who pulled their name, the only rule is that you can't buy for your own partner. Each person provides a wish list of a variety of gift ideas in a range of price points and one person ONLY buys gifts for one other person, using the wish list as a guide. You can either buy several smaller gifts or one big one from the list but you spend to the budget. The recipient gets a surprise but they also know they'll get something they actually want.

It works fantastically well. It keeps the workload and the guesswork and the stress to a minimum and it keeps the budget tightly controlled. I wish we'd started it years earlier. No more pointless, panic-bought tat and gift sets of things I'll never use.

But can I ask why this is an issue with your in-laws only? What are you doing with your own family?

I have a similar problem. Because DP is the only child-free sibling the others feel they have to give me something because he gives their kids money.

Luckily I'm a vegan it's an easy win. They ask what i want and I always answer "Vegan chocolate! And some bonios for DDog!". So they don't spend too much, they feel like they've given me a treat and DDog and me gets snacks - win win!

Why don't you suggest buying each other a special bauble or decoration each for each other's Christmas trees?