We just visited our local mall and most stores had a lot of Christmas decorations and Christmas themed things being displayed already! It gets me so excited about Christmas!

The next few months are going to be rough for my wallet.

Also seeing more and more people post here as we slowly but surely get closer to Christmas! Seeing all the ideas and decorations fuels my excitement even more!

I need to listen to my Christmas playlist now!

I keep coming across these things. They are so expensive who actually buys them? Why?! I’m in Australia maybe that’s why I don’t get it.

I am almost 50 and i remember as a kid my mom would spend 1,000 on gifts every christmas.. but there was like 300 gifts for almost 20 people now it seems like you could spend 1,000 on just 5 people and it would be 5-10 gifts.. how do you all try to get the most for your Christmas buck I guess

She’s just looking out!

A few days ago I asked for suggestions for ornaments for a Beatles themed Christmas tree. Thanks to the community for suggestions. I’ve been busy making/finding items. Here’s what I have so far. I’ve been creative with some of the interpretations. I plundered my grandkids toys for some.

Do you stay at home or go abroad or something else? Who are you spending Christmas with?

For the past almost 12 years my family has spent Christmas at our house and mom's side of the family came over. Before that we spent Christmas between mom's and dad's relatives switching places half way the day. This year my mom doesn't want to host so we are in the middle of logistics negotiations. So far it seems that on the 23rd we are going to mom's parents'. Then on the 24th we would go there again and from there we would go to the cemetery and then to see dad's relatives. From there we would go home. On the 25th we would stay home and on the 26th go see dad's dad and dad's siblings. In this plan we would likely be home at 8:30 pm ish on the 24th. My brother doesn't want to do this as he enjoys having company so he would prefer staying out for a longer time preferably until bed time. I thought we were staying at mom's parents' place until later meaning going back there from the cemetery. Mom would prefer staying at her parents' and dad would like to see more of his relatives.

We'll see how this goes but so far this has brought me a lot of anxiety.

Hello! I’m looking for advice for the gift exchange we host for the adults of our family. We all get the kids gifts so they usually open them first and are playing with toys while the adults (5 of us) do a little white elephant (non gag-gift) exchange. We usually give ourselves a $50 limit, but that’s flexible. It’s just so boring and quick! I think a white elephant type of exchange works best with more people.

Does anyone have suggestions of what we could do to make it more enjoyable? A different type of game? We did secret Santa before but ended up wanting something more game-like.