More? - Post-Holiday Reflections.
This may be our most excessive Christmas holiday yet. My daughter got overloaded with new dresses from one grandma and dolls from the other. Of course they'll tell you three new dresses and three dolls are not too much. And I have to admit we bought her about seven new books. My bookish husband and I don't have much time to shop, so when we do, we tend to go overboard. We also discovered a lot of the space stuff my son is into this year, so he got three Guardians of the Galaxy toys. The baby was given two rattles by each grandma plus I don't remember what else. Such is the problem when too much stuff comes at once.
The number of presents they get is all the more overwhelming since one of their grandmas gives them "twelve gifts of Christmas"--which means they have twenty new items already even before Christmas Eve! The baby is not included yet, so next year, it will be thirty-six presents, plus! My mother-in-law does not limit herself to one major gift each. Of course they love it, but it concerned my husband and me. When my eldest was baptized, I proposed to my family that we wait till we've seen her presents from other people before we buy our own presents for her, to avoid duplication. I follow this practical policy on birthdays as well. But I am the only one. The grandmothers feel gifts are central to the occasion. Despite our hints that we don't want stuff to be the focus.
While holiday shopping we discovered the book More. It's the picture story of a mouse and a magpie who collect stuff from a junkpile and end up unable to carry all their stuff. The story is told in far less words in the book, appropriately. Perhaps it was finding this book that encouraged us to reduce our purchases, taking out a book that we had once borrowed from the library and such.
I made it a point to read this book to my preschool son when he was looking for still more Christmas presents to open. I understand his wistfulness at not receiving nearly as many presents as his teacher dad and grade-schooler sister, whose has almost triple the number of classmates, and who the grandmas tend to get more excited about buying girly stuff. She is the opposite--once she's opened a few presents and gets excited about them, she settles down to try them out and forgets to open any others for a while.
I'm not sure the lesson sank in yet. He cried because we wouldn't let him bring home his new Play-Doh set from Grammy's yet because he had a big container of blocks from her to bring home. And with all his other toys, we thought the Play-Doh was already excessive, not to mention messy.
Actually, he is not the only one who can benefit from the book's lesson. Back in November, I said that I didn't need to go shopping for my kids' presents. I still had a lot of stuff in my closet I was keeping for them.
So what happened? There were toy sales. And with three children, if you have that special find for one, you feel you have to get as much for the other.
I partly blame the retailers. Some years you can hardly find anything nice. This year we saw so many cute clothes and unique toys. I have already issued a new t-shirt ban but still they each got one or two that were, according to the grandma who bought them, irresistible.
My mother-in-law told me not to worry about the dolls, though. She would buy a shelf for them.
Santa was wiser. Santa had enough for two stockings each for the older kids by November. Some of the things had been in our closets for a year or more, waiting for the right time. Including a 15 peso (30 US cent) book about Wise Men from outer space, A Cosmic Christmas. The only stocking item bought in December, originally chosen for my son, was a tiny skateboard, which cost less than a dollar but she has now decorated beautifully with glitter pens. Oh, and the baby's cute bobblehead dragon just like one from the corner thrift shop.
Strange, but I don't even remember the Santa stocking presents except for those, the Junie B. paperback with Junie B. Jones and the Yucky Blucky Fruitcake and Junie B., First Grader: Jingle Bells, Batman Smells! (P.S. So Does May.) and my son's Max And Ruby Maxs Christmas. These are the things that really engaged my children and became memorable.
Don't get me wrong, I think most of the stuff they got was great, and really suited to their interests. The trouble is having so much of it ALL AT ONCE. Spacing it out over twelve days is not enough. My son wants to open and try everything out right away. My daughter also gets pretty excited about gifts when she first sees them. But with fast-paced gift-opening and using, do they even remember who gave them the present? Often they forget, defeating the purpose of gift-giving in the first place. It's supposed to be about expressing love, not about cluttering our house with more things.
The avalanche of presents is supposed to help make Christmas special. But too much and the holiday becomes all about presents. And that saddens me. We had none of our usual outings to see lights this year. Only Disney on Ice. Too many activities is tiring too, of course; what is needed is a balance. I wanted to have twelve days of special activities--many at home--instead of twelve days of presents.
I admit I'm disgruntled too at being overshadowed. Aside from those two in her stocking, my daughter has not even looked at the five other books we got for her. And on Christmas night, she stationed her dolls on one half of our bed and wouldn't let anyone move them to make room for us to sleep.
I would take her attachment to stuff more seriously if I didn't know that she gets obsessed with a new thing for a week or two, then forgets about it. Which is why I think it might be better to have more occasions for presents to space out the giving.
Except the way the grandmas are, that won't be a solution. They won't spread out what they give so much as buy more for each occasion!
Perhaps there is no solution other than to let the kids enjoy their gifts but let other things take priority over gifts. Focus not on the blocks and Play-Doh but the fun they had playing with the toys with their cousins. And after the holiday excesses, quietly clear away all but their favorites to take out on other occasions.
The number of presents they get is all the more overwhelming since one of their grandmas gives them "twelve gifts of Christmas"--which means they have twenty new items already even before Christmas Eve! The baby is not included yet, so next year, it will be thirty-six presents, plus! My mother-in-law does not limit herself to one major gift each. Of course they love it, but it concerned my husband and me. When my eldest was baptized, I proposed to my family that we wait till we've seen her presents from other people before we buy our own presents for her, to avoid duplication. I follow this practical policy on birthdays as well. But I am the only one. The grandmothers feel gifts are central to the occasion. Despite our hints that we don't want stuff to be the focus.
While holiday shopping we discovered the book More. It's the picture story of a mouse and a magpie who collect stuff from a junkpile and end up unable to carry all their stuff. The story is told in far less words in the book, appropriately. Perhaps it was finding this book that encouraged us to reduce our purchases, taking out a book that we had once borrowed from the library and such.
I made it a point to read this book to my preschool son when he was looking for still more Christmas presents to open. I understand his wistfulness at not receiving nearly as many presents as his teacher dad and grade-schooler sister, whose has almost triple the number of classmates, and who the grandmas tend to get more excited about buying girly stuff. She is the opposite--once she's opened a few presents and gets excited about them, she settles down to try them out and forgets to open any others for a while.
I'm not sure the lesson sank in yet. He cried because we wouldn't let him bring home his new Play-Doh set from Grammy's yet because he had a big container of blocks from her to bring home. And with all his other toys, we thought the Play-Doh was already excessive, not to mention messy.
Actually, he is not the only one who can benefit from the book's lesson. Back in November, I said that I didn't need to go shopping for my kids' presents. I still had a lot of stuff in my closet I was keeping for them.
So what happened? There were toy sales. And with three children, if you have that special find for one, you feel you have to get as much for the other.
I partly blame the retailers. Some years you can hardly find anything nice. This year we saw so many cute clothes and unique toys. I have already issued a new t-shirt ban but still they each got one or two that were, according to the grandma who bought them, irresistible.
My mother-in-law told me not to worry about the dolls, though. She would buy a shelf for them.
Santa was wiser. Santa had enough for two stockings each for the older kids by November. Some of the things had been in our closets for a year or more, waiting for the right time. Including a 15 peso (30 US cent) book about Wise Men from outer space, A Cosmic Christmas. The only stocking item bought in December, originally chosen for my son, was a tiny skateboard, which cost less than a dollar but she has now decorated beautifully with glitter pens. Oh, and the baby's cute bobblehead dragon just like one from the corner thrift shop.
Strange, but I don't even remember the Santa stocking presents except for those, the Junie B. paperback with Junie B. Jones and the Yucky Blucky Fruitcake and Junie B., First Grader: Jingle Bells, Batman Smells! (P.S. So Does May.) and my son's Max And Ruby Maxs Christmas. These are the things that really engaged my children and became memorable.
Don't get me wrong, I think most of the stuff they got was great, and really suited to their interests. The trouble is having so much of it ALL AT ONCE. Spacing it out over twelve days is not enough. My son wants to open and try everything out right away. My daughter also gets pretty excited about gifts when she first sees them. But with fast-paced gift-opening and using, do they even remember who gave them the present? Often they forget, defeating the purpose of gift-giving in the first place. It's supposed to be about expressing love, not about cluttering our house with more things.
The avalanche of presents is supposed to help make Christmas special. But too much and the holiday becomes all about presents. And that saddens me. We had none of our usual outings to see lights this year. Only Disney on Ice. Too many activities is tiring too, of course; what is needed is a balance. I wanted to have twelve days of special activities--many at home--instead of twelve days of presents.
I admit I'm disgruntled too at being overshadowed. Aside from those two in her stocking, my daughter has not even looked at the five other books we got for her. And on Christmas night, she stationed her dolls on one half of our bed and wouldn't let anyone move them to make room for us to sleep.
I would take her attachment to stuff more seriously if I didn't know that she gets obsessed with a new thing for a week or two, then forgets about it. Which is why I think it might be better to have more occasions for presents to space out the giving.
Except the way the grandmas are, that won't be a solution. They won't spread out what they give so much as buy more for each occasion!
Perhaps there is no solution other than to let the kids enjoy their gifts but let other things take priority over gifts. Focus not on the blocks and Play-Doh but the fun they had playing with the toys with their cousins. And after the holiday excesses, quietly clear away all but their favorites to take out on other occasions.
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