Sunday, October 26, 2014

Materialism

Between the two ideas expressed by Amel Saleh and Lauren Smith, I agree with Smith and her idea that gift giving is not materialistic. I love to buy gifts for my family because present time during Christmas is such a fun time. Every Christmas, my family likes to spend the day with extended family in an awesome Chirstmas party and at night, we go home and open the presents we got each other. We don’t rush and tear up each wrapped-up box.  Everyone sits in a circle and one by one, we each open up a gift and see what we got. During the process, everyone is talking, laughing, and having a great time. It is something that is more fun than I make it sound. Just because gifts are a highly anticipated part of Christmas, it does not take away the meaningful moments that Christmas brings. If anything, it enforces selflessness and quality family time. In the spirit of selflessness, my family donates some of our clothing and old toys to Goodwill each Christmas season.

            In my family, everyone usually gets a present for one another, whether it be home-made or not. My parents give each of us, four kids, forty dollars and we get to come up with our own present ideas. When it comes to gift buying for our extended family, we all play Secret Santa to make sure everyone gets a gift without each of us going broke. Throughout December everyone tries to find out their Secret Santa and so they send obvious “subliminal” messages to everyone on the list. It is hilarious and makes the whole month fun. Then comes the Christmas party where everyone reveals who they got and some people realize their quest to find their Secret Santa was horribly off track. We have done this for as long as I can remember and it makes the holiday season something I impatiently wait for, each year.

10 comments:

  1. You have some great family traditions. I agree with what you said about gift-giving. It's a great way to spend time with your family while having a fun time.

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  2. I love the idea of secret Santa because its more about enjoying the gift with everyone around and enjoying it. Always fun to have family around

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  3. Gift giving makes everyone feel good. Family is the real gift on Christmas.

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  4. Gift-giving is really awesome and exiticing, especially on your family traditions. It is really a way to spend more time with family.

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  5. It sounds like your family has great balance of holiday spirit and gift exchanges. I love the Secret Santa story, that sounds so fun!

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  6. Family traditions in my opinion makes it more fun, mainly because they don't get old and you sometimes get to share them with the people you love and maybe even pass them on to your own family.

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  7. Your family has nice traditions. I can imagine how much fun the secret santa tradition is.

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  8. Sounds like tons of fun with how your family handles the holidays. Great family tradition. My family does the exact Secret Santa.

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  9. Secret Santa is the best thing to do to make sure everyone receives a gift.

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  10. Your family traditions sound so nice. The whole Secret Santa and 40$ limit is a great way to keep under budget and make sure everyone is included.

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