Time to make you cringe...It's 3 months until CHRISTmas. HOW MUCH do you spend?

Give with a genuine heart of giving can't be materialistic! A gift can be a homemade card...baked goods...etc. I listen through out the year...often some one near me mentions something and I tuck the thought away. Example an employee mentioned last year he hasn't gotten a gift in 16 years...another time he mentioned how he loved fish. So I made him a beta fish plant vase. He loves it. Named the fish...talks to it all the time. Sometimes simplistic is the best and not materialistic at all!

Very sweet! I can do both. In general I really like to give. I just get all confused at Christmas, especially for my kids.

I don't have a job this year so I'm working on some projects as gifts, like scarfs and some sewing projects. But my family is awesome and so understanding. We don't really care about gifts as long we're together. We do a lot of tamales and we have a gingerbread house contest.

There are only four grandkids: my two cousins, my brother and I. So my older cousin and I form team 1 and my brother and younger cousin form team 2. My team usually wins because my brother and younger cousin end up eating the gingerbread before they finish!

This year we are planning on going to visit grandma and my aunts, uncle and cousins in Dallas. Sometimes they come over and sometimes we go over. I'm excited and I hope it snows this year.
Another tradition is that we bake Jesus a cake for his birthday. For birthdays, we go all out with the cake and we think it's necessary for us to make Christ a cake on his day too
Lastly we usually attend midnight mass. Half of my family is Catholic and those of us that aren't still go because we were raised that way. I'm non-denominational btw. But yeah this mass is very beautiful. They sing Christmas carols, everyone dresses up, the priest talks about the Christmas story and at the end we sing Happy Birthday. Even though I'm not Catholic, I think it's very beautiful what they do and I enjoy it that day.

Before Christmas, I volunteer at a children's shelter to wrap the children's gifts and decorate for their Christmas party. This will be my fifth year doing this. It's a humbling experience but I love the kids! I've known some of them for all five years.

I don't really like that Christmas has become such a commercial holiday but it is what it is. My family is pretty laid back and don't go crazy with spending.

Hey kid if it isn't going to be a traditional Christmas let the Blond invite you to come to Florida for a Florida Christmas... I am not kidding. We open presents on Christmas day in usually 70 degree weather. There have been a few Christmases we went out to the beach. We have an extra bedroom with it's own bathroom and just let me know if tourists need to set an extra plate at the table....

I want on that list....lol

For years my Daughter and I would shop for foster children sponsored through my job with money the men at work didn't want to do the shopping and then we would tear up the living room with gift wrap and presents to wrap for these kids and I always bought an age appropriate Bible to add in. It had become a tradition for us and then I got laid off from my job over two years ago so that first Christmas I was sad not to be doing it... I had called up work and asked if I could still help out with it and they had laid off so many people that there wasn't enough people sponsoring kids that year.

But last year they called me up and we did it again... and I am in hopes I will hear from them again this year as it is such fun to go and shop for kids in need.

About three years in a row we were building gingerbread houses... the first or second was our favorite as it was trying to collapse and our favorite feature of it was a toothpick tinfoil satelight dish...it was hilarious...wish I had a picture I could attach....

Marrying tourist last year added a new tradition with his family having what they call the dice game going on for 50 years. They have a stack of presents in the middle of the room and roll dice if you roll a one you roll again if you get a two roll again and continue up to six if rolled in consecutive order 1-6.... you pick out a present from the pile of the number you roll in a row... if you don't get a one you pass the dice to the next person... it was fun.

But it is the family time and the food and fun.... if I have money I spend it if I don't then I make something.... it is usually a great time of year and like Willie try to stay under that $30,000.00...lol

We go to the beach most Christmas's as well! Make sand angels and sandmen! Love Florida!

Am I the only one that isn't a huge fan of Christmas? I, of course, don't absolutely hate it and I do enjoy spending it with certain people, I suppose. I haven't liked it for the past few years, though.

I didn't celebrate Christmas since I was like a kid lol, until last year. Maybe it's just me getting older, but I kind of realized it was about spending time with and enjoying family. I decided to forget everything else and do it for them.

On that note, I still absolutely despise the crowds, decorations, and hearing Christmas "music" everywhere you go XD

Yes, it's more about family for me than anything else.

remove the deceitfulness of santa and elves and flying reindeer wrapping of gifts and decorating christmas trees and the seriousness of dark depression and credit card debt when its all over.... and stick to the fellowship of saints feeding the poor and hungry clothing the naked opening the eyes of the blind to sound doctrine visiting the widows and fatherless glorifying God and Christ with worship and continual praise

...And the King shall answer and say unto them, verily i say unto you, inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.
....but now after that ye have known God, or rather are known of God, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements, whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage?
Ye observe days, and months and times and years.
I am afraid of you, least i have bestowed upon you labor in vain

chistmas ba humbug if i am to celebrate anything i think it would be his death and victory over sin and death for our sake.
Imagine Christ in a glorious state in heaven with the father and the day he has to leave this and be born a measly man on this earth knowing fully he will be despised and rejected hated of men falsely accused and put to death crucified on a cross and shamed...oh what a glorious day.

oh yeah the question...how much do i spend...guess it depends on how many i come across in need...charity whats that cost.
Merry Christmas

Society has turned Christmas into something it isn't.. Just look at Black Friday. That is not God oriented at all.

Awwwww thank you! You're so kind

My siblings and I are gonna spend Christmas together. And there's another plan that's in the works teehee

I've grown to loathe the commercialization of Christmas. Mainly it's because it shows the inner greediness in people. If/when you work retail during the holiday season, you hear a lot of kids throwing tantrums if they are not getting what they want with the parents giving in to every outburst they have. Makes me regret all the times I've been 'greedy' and expected a lot during this time. Then you have the adult customers who expect you to answer their questions when you have at least ten of them surrounding you.

Generally, I don't throw have anything big for when it comes to Christmas anymore. I can see it as a time to spend with those you love and having a mini feast. Can't say as to whether or not I advocate it as a religious tradition since anyone can celebrate it for different reasons, plus the origins of it. Anyway, that can be saved for another time when the forums are flooded with 'Should Christmas be celebrated?' once that time comes.

I spend much blood and tears, but I get overtime.

A lot of us blame society as though we're removed from it, but if we're being honest about it, a lot of Christians celebrate modern Christmas just the same as the next person (I'm not calling you out, specifically). It's hardly society's fault that people are tools; that we're easily inspirited to spend, spend, spend.

I don't like the commercialization of it all either, but I do enjoy exchanging gifts with people close to my heart.

I stopped buying presents years ago. I send cards, though.