What if you didn’t give Christmas gifts to your loved ones? This woman explains why she won’t buy anything for her children or her family this year.
We love spoiling our loved ones for the holidays, but what if that was a bad thing? Without wanting to play the Grinch, this mother explains why she decided not to give gifts, either to her children or to her family. While most are in the last Christmas shopping (discover these ideas for cheap gifts and the best according to their astrological sign), others are pointing the finger the bad sides of this frantic holiday rush.
Giving for the sake of giving is not the best thing. A study shows the gift that women especially don’t want. And in the Mail Online, Dinah Van Tulleken looks back on her realization a year ago. Seeing unused gifts made her decision, and her husband was delighted. But when it came to children, he was more reluctant. “You mean Santa is going to bring them everything?”, he asked with a wink. She told him no, the man with the white beard does not exist and their three and six year old toddlers will not have any presents : “We have […] the equivalent of two entire bathtubs filled with plastic games: LEGO, Playmobil, Sylvanian Families…”.
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Stop buying gifts at Christmas: a good idea?
Aware of waste and the impact of their purchases on the planet, Dinah thinks that the holidays are not made for “buy, buy, buy”. What’s more, the cost of living has increased and this is putting real pressure on the shoulders of many. Lack of time, Many of us buy a last minute gift that will stay in the cupboards. While she loves Christmas and has wonderful childhood memories tied to it, she feels it is important to make a change. But this was not accepted very well by some members of his family. Her sister, for example, considers that it is not fair that she cannot spoil her nieces just because Dinah does not want gifts and “takes away the joy of Christmas”. For her, the happiness of his daughters is not in these toys that advertising sold to them and of which they actually only use one percent. They prefer to build a cabin, draw on the furniture, collect snails in the garden or even watch a movie.
Dinah Van Tulleken also clarifies that she not only does not want to give gifts, but that she does not wish to receive any. This would in particular generate guilt, and the feeling of being obliged to offer something in return. How does she proceed then? She resorts to renting, like for her daughter’s violin or her other daughter’s bicycle. They used them little and the objects in very good condition will be used by other children now. With her husband, she will also bring out a dollhouse that the older one hasn’t used for two years and offer it to the youngest. They will also slip into their Christmas stockings second-hand stuffed animals and toys that she has been accumulating for several months already.
As for her husband, his gift is less time on his phone and fewer weekends at work, which means more time with them (the dates are even already set in their calendar). They give each other the same gift: dates together, with evenings already planned with a babysitter. For other adults, she made a habit of giving something for charity. She feared people’s reaction but in the end, they all took it very well.
If she is aware that the older her children get, the more complicated it will be to stay with this “non-gift” tradition, she intends to keep it as much as she can, in order to pass on one very specific thing to her daughters: Christmas is not about things, but about family.
Editor for Aufeminin since 2022, Charlotte is passionate about cinema, French and international, and a fortune reader. Curious about everything, she talks as much about personalities as…