After a very busy period of work, I finally had a little time this weekend to catch up on the rest of my life.
Since it’s early December, and I’m not so good about unsubscribing to advertising emails from companies I like, I had many, many emails imploring me to save money by buying something.
And so, this weekend I did. I bought many somethings.
I can’t decide if I was a sucker for advertising and the holiday sales complex, or if I was clever and bought what I wanted at a discount.
Most of my purchases were presents. Baskets of consumables, which might be overpriced (but were on sale), and which won’t leave behind too much for the recipients to clear away. Or else clothing, which is usually much appreciated and actually worn. Also on sale.
What I found interesting, and a little disturbing, was how much I wanted to spend money this weekend. It was a little like being told I couldn’t have chocolate for the rest of the day, and then all I could think about was chocolate.
It makes me wonder about the no-spend month and how it might backfire.
Whether I was clever and found a good sale, or a sucker; or practiced delayed gratification to good effect vs succumbed to marketing; my holiday shopping is nearly complete. So I suppose it was a winning weekend after all.
How are you managing your holiday gift giving?
We’ve cut back significantly this year largely because, with our daughters both living away, they won’t want to lug a bunch of gifts across the country when they go home. We paid for their flights home and got them each a couple of small gifts. And my husband and I agreed to scale back our gift giving for each other as well.
It sounds like it is just your immediate family that you give gifts to?
We are still giving to adult siblings, let alone the next generation. And some gifts of appreciation to people we work with–the accountant for Mr. PiN’s parents’ estate deserves many thanks. I guess this stuff just adds up (or provides a good excuse to go shopping).