Saturday, November 10, 2007

It's early, but...Christmas!

OK, here's a post I really like, about Christmas and frugality over at Being Frugal.net.

I used to love the fall and winter holidays, starting with Halloween, moving to Thanksgiving (love to go shopping in downtown right after Thanksgiving, everyone is still happy and cheerful), Solstice and Christmas. For me, it's more a celebration of the lovely cool weather than the specific religious aspects of the season. We always have a tree, decorated by the children (with help from the cats). We enjoy hot cider, cookies, and, some of us indulge in fruitcake.

None of those things cost much money. You can make a pot of hot cider, with applejuice and a few spices, for about a dollar. A tree? Well, get a forest service permit and you can choose a great tree for just a little $$. Or, buy the "Charlie Brown" tree for about $5 or $7 bucks. You can enjoy the lights and bustle of downtown shopping and not actually spend any money. Visit Santa and let the kids tell him what they want, there's no need to buy the fancy picture package.

In this sense, I think the folks spouting about keeping the Christ in Christmas have a good point-the season isn't about what you can buy but what you believe, whether it's that Jesus was born or that the Sun King is returning or that the oil lasted the full eight days. Or simply that life is precious, and goes all too fast.

How will you keep clutter away at the holidays?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

You've already read about how I will keep clutter out of the holidays. Thanks for the mention!

And great post! You're absolutely right!

Anonymous said...

I really like your post. I'm hoping to just keep things simple during the holiday season, instead of buying things, create experiences, much like the ones at the website you mentioned. I love those ideas.