I got all of my Christmas shopping done before lunch today. Cyber Monday (or Black Monday) is the best thing ever invented for people like me who don’t want to beat the Christmas spirit out of rude and ill-mannered shoppers. Also, it’s tight this year-- only my immediate family got store bought gifts.
A mini-camcorder
2 sweaters
Ultimate CD collector’s edition with bonus DVD
One PC game
A deep fryer
HO train extender set
2 books
All for under two hunnert simoleons. And no shipping costs! This year was the easiest and cheapest of all the years ever.
How is your Christmas shopping going? Are you being not patriotic like me and spending less on less people? Real life stores, on line shopping or both? If both, more RL store shopping or on-line shopping? And, most importantly, can you beat my Christmas shopping SCORE! ?
Foot bath with massage jets, neck massage pillow, 2 regular pillows, a soup/salad lunch container, and 2 Home Depot gift cards. Everything exept the gift cards came from Boscov’s and wrapped for free. I spent just over a hundred dollars.
Finished the shopping about two weeks ago. I refuse to go into the crowds at the stores after the first week or so of November.
I wonder about some people, though. I think the rushed holiday shopping at the last minute (for some people) is a bunch of hooey. Where I work, for some of my colleagues, it seems to be a badge of honour to be out shopping at 10 pm on Dec. 24th.
If you celebrate it, you know Christmas comes on Dec. 25th. It hasn’t changed in years. Literally. It is not as if you don’t know it is coming. Especially since the stores and ads start the season in October.
Oh, and I make it easy on myself. Most people I exchange gifts with can buy what they want, so I don’t sweat over finding the ‘perfect gift’. I give something useful. For the men in my life, they get a sweater. For the women in my life, they get a nice, hardback book or a really nice set of sleepwear. I go to one store, and make all purchases there. Then, the next year, the men in my life get something else, as do the women. But, since they all live in different time zones, who cares if I bought 5 of one item. They don’t know this is how I manage to get it all done in under 2 hours.
Good luck to all of you who have a more challenging time as I know it can be very hard. This is why I made new rules for me and have managed to put some sanity into my life at this busy time of year.
(Oh yeah… the first year I was with my husband, after I got all my shoppng done and mailed to my family, at about Dec. 22nd or so, he announced “we need to go get the shopping done for my family”. I just looked at him, held my gaze, and told him that “he” has to get the shopping done for his family. I kissed him goodbye as he left for the mall!).
We always do it after Christmas in a no sales tax state like NH. Because we’re all heathen and cheap like that.
This year I’m buying my parents a teeny tiny camera, probably the canon powershot sd1000 but I’m going to warn them I’ll ship it to them after I take it to Belize. They’ll understand.
My sister and brother-in-law I plan to give a gift certificate to Crate and Barrel as they recently bought a house. And my boyfriend gets a chic sweater like James Bond gets to wear in Quantum of Solace.
I also plan to give my friend a gift certificate for books and makeup which I think she deserves after a very hard year (she had two kids in two years, they’re both toddlers now and I think she’s exhausted).
