I was wondering if there is a tactful way to tell friends who buy gifts (birthday & holidays) that you want to stop it or only do it for the kids. One of my friends' this could be hard with because her birthday is Christmas day so I normally give her a birthday present but she does not celebrate Christmas (she is Indian)! It is just getting expensive with all the kid parties and things that come up that I would like to skip adult birthdays (unless invited to a party of course) and Christmas/Hanukkah gifts. Thank you!
We did this a couple years ago...
What we did was to say WE only wanted presents for kiddo on xmas/bdays. That way they give one and we give one (kiddo gives them a present).
Tell your friends that you have all that you want or can get what you want and what you would like to do is share your special talents (homemade) instead of buying commercial things for the holidays. I love making homemade gifts for the adults in my family - we share our special recipes for birthdays and Christmas presents instead of buying things. We do get small, but practical gifts for the children. If we do choose to buy something it is a special lotion or a neat jar of jelly or something that gets used.
I hope it helps. We have a very large family and this is how we handled the gift process. I enjoy the new dishes that I get to take home every year. Now that my children are older, they are showing their culinary talents!
Good luck! S--
Just tell them like it is. They are your friends after all and some of them might feel the same way. Making gifts is always a good idea. Or just do cards. Or my favorite...go out to eat or get a coffee together for the b-day. My dad (who is oh so funny) told us kids we have to start signing his cards in pencile so he can re-use them...so I just started making him cards. We all feel the tuff times economically, especially when we have kids. Best of Luck
i was just thinking about this. I had a wonderful friend who moved away and we would send gifts but it's been a long time now and we don't really keep in touch anymore it's just a routine that i would like to stop. she has more money than me to so i don't think it's an issue for her at all but, the joy has gone out of it for me. I hope you get some good answers.
If you would start making homemade ornaments or cookies/fudge/candy, you could give to several people and yet still save a bit of $. I personally am very crafty. Last year I made all of my adult friends homemade socks. It cost me $6/ pair for the yarn and a few hrs' time to make up each sock. The year before everyone got scarves. There's also some very awesome items at the Dollar Tree. OR...you could just outright tell them that you just can not afford to get everyone gifts. There's really no reason to beat around the bush about it...just be honest.
You could always make gifts instead of buying them. I love getting cobblers, cookies, candy, etc.
Just tell them "You guys don't need to buy gifts for my bday anymore, but you are more than welcome to do so for the kids". They probably want to be relieved from that routine too anyway.
With a few of my friends I have asked for a "selfish gift", the gift of time with each other.
I took my agenda and told the person I wanted to make sure we saw each other at least once a month just the 2 of us. We made it a goal to each month pick a date, time and place and set everything else aside for at least 1 hour.. It has been wonderful. Most times it has ended up being 2 hours..
We have not always been able to schedule for EVERY month, but we have not missed many.
