Advent Conspiracy

Christmas changed for us last year. We remembered 'the reason for the season' and celebrated accordingly. We had slowly been moving towards this but our pending move to NYC pushed us into it completely. Why should we buy more presents when we are selling everything we own? For the past few years, the in-laws had all agreed to give the girls money towards their college tuition savings program and give them something small just to open. My family would not agree to that so we continued to over-indulge buying the girls things that they didn't need and/or would get donated within a few months. They received so many presents that I used to keep some unopened stored in a closet to pull out and give to them at a later date so they wouldn't be so over-whelmed with everything that they got. My Mom lost her job last year so they finally had no choice but to scale Christmas giving back to one present only (that my Mom had already purchased before she lost her job) for each child. My MIL stresses about Christmas giving. This year my Dad is stressing about not having money to buy even one present for each grandchild. A 34 year old man was killed on Black Friday because of the madness. With the current economy, I would think that others would be pushed to remember the real reason for the season but I guess it hasn't done that. It's only created more stress on buying presents with money that they don't have. This year the girls will each get 3 presents, just like last year, because that is what Jesus got. But they will be small presents that aren't expensive and that don't take up a lot of room.

I won't be mailing out Christmas cards again this year. I don't have the time nor the desire to spend the money on cards and stamps only to them thrown into the trash within a few weeks. We will try to focus on the reason for the holiday and not the madness that surrounds it these days. We won't be buying presents for anyone else either. I'll do my holiday baking and pass out cookies and breads. We'll also give to Kensington's 'Christmas Has A Face' holiday campaign where all of the money collected will go towards needy families in the Metro Detroit area for food and clothing. We are so blessed to have more than we need.