Celebrate Christmas through meaningful giving, as opposed to engaging in consumption for its own sake regardless of need.

I made advent calendars for three of my friends this year, for each of them out of a specific reason.

N. once told me that she always makes a calendar for her boyfriend, but never gets one from him. So this year they got one from me for both of them.

J. always wants to have some of the cookies I take with me to scouts group. So I made her a calendar full of cookies in different forms.

U. thinks she isn’t cool enough for her friends. So I asked everyone to participate in an electronic advent calender and now she’ll get an e-mail from one of us per day.

I love giving where it’s meaningful and unexpected. It’s fun to think of these ideas and even more fun to execute them and even MORE fun to imagine that they make people smile.

Now on to the Christmas presents…

Picked up a bunch of canned goods today! On sale at the supermarket. We’re dropping them off at the food drive on Saturday. Each week, when we get groceries, we’ll pick up a few more canned goods and donate. It’s not much, but we can’t afford to go all out and double our grocery bill, you know? So we’ll do what we can. _{no pun intended}

Some years my goal for this part of the year is just to survive Christmas, but this sounds much more positive (although I may recycle the survival goal as well).

I have an odd sense of being stuck between the things I love about Christmas: seeing family, the time and meals together, telling stories, trimming the tree, driving around to see the lights, making truffles and sending cards, watching the good old movies, the first snow, the shiny ornaments, Isak’s joyfulness, etc. and the things I loathe: the “stuff focus”, the garish underbelly of Christmas with blaring music, dancing Santas and frantic mall people.

I don’t mean to sound like a scrooge, and I love finding just the right, thoughtful item for someone, I just wish we could forgo the Stuff pressure sometimes. The funny thing is the whole family feels this way. Mom has insisted we keep this Christmas low key, so I’m hoping we can.

Every year it seems I let myself get stressed for no reason, then things turn around and we all have a great time. I wish I could enter the season with a freer spirit right from the beginning. Right now I’m back to dreading tromping through the cold and wet with the rest of the masses in search of things.

And that reminded me of the goal and led me to a very interesting person and interview.

Here is an interview with Micah White, a writer for Adbusters.
He is being interviewed here with an audience of progressive Christians. They are talking about consumerism, among other things.
Very interesting!

http://www.micahmwhite.com/
it’s on the bottom right side of the page.

_{Micah White is a Contributing Editor at Adbusters where he writes articles from a philosophical activist perspective. His most well-known piece is Commit Facebook Suicide in which he argued that social networking websites represent the commercialization of friendship.}

An accomplished activist, Micah’s innovative campaigns have been featured in the AP, the Chronicle for Higher Education, and the New York Times. He has been profiled by Teen People, interviewed on Pacifica Radio and been a guest on ABC’s Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher. Micah has organized successful campaigns against diverse targets such as Diebold Election Systems and Bates Troy Healthcare Linens, a small-time noise polluter in Binghamton, NY.

Micah M. White lives with his wife and two cats in Berkeley, CA. He is currently writing a book on the future of activism in which he argues for a connection between the lack of mental clarity in our times and the way our culture organizes knowledge. Micah writes that the future of activism is as the vanguard of a cultural battle over our mental environment.

I copied the following list of “most needed food items” from one of the local California Second Harvest drives:

MOST NEEDED FOODS

The Food Bank needs nutritious, non-perishable foods:

• Meals in a can (stew, chili, soup)
• Tuna / canned meat
• Peanut butter
• Canned foods with pop-top lids
• Low sugar cereals
• 100% fruit juices in single serving boxes
• Canned fruit packed in juice
• Canned vegetables (low salt)

Please avoid donating items packaged in glass.

We request that you do not purchase bulk quantities of rice, flour or sugar for donation. Thank you!

_{Here is one from Tennessee: Peanut Butter, Canned Tuna, Canned Fruits, Rice, Beans, Macaroni and Cheese, and Canned Vegetables, or other Canned Meats. And here is one from Wisconsin: Canned Meat, Beef Stew, Tuna, Canned Chili, Peanut Butter, Canned and Dried Beans, Canned Fruit, Canned Vegetables, Canned Soup, Fruit Juices, Jelly, Pasta, Rice, Instant Potatoes, Macaroni & Cheese, Cereal, Pancake Mix, Oatmeal, Cake Mixes, Canned Milk, Instant Pudding}

Just to give you an idea to get started. Those of you who have memberships to someplace like CostCo might even consider buying a case of a particular food to donate, if you can afford it.

If you are making this donation in lieu of a gift to a loved one, you might take a photo of the food you purchased, enclose it in a card, and write a note to let them know that you gave a donation of food in their honor. Just an idea

_{image:members.shaw.ca}

is one I dislike.
I was in retail before my delivery job.
So for the last 30 plus years I have been right in the crossfire.
I’m amazed at the get as much as you can attitude.
Some things are fine to get as much as you can.
Friends, tenderness and love spring to mind.
Merchandise doesn’t.
So I will give of myself as I can this year,
as I have in many of the previous ones…

Somehow, it’s so much more rewarding…

I’m baking bread. Next chance I get, I want to go to Hobby Lobby and see what all I can find. :) Depending on who all will be coming for Christams (i.e., kidlets), I may also make some candied apples or fudge, or something among those lines. But the fact that bread will be baked and given away is for sure. :):)

I hate going there, but I am glad that I did as they have the “Angel Trees” out already. I used to do this when my kids were little. We would pick out several kids (always the same gender and age as each of my kids) and then they would go Angel Tree Shopping for their counterpart.

We haven;t done Angel Tree in a number of years.

I am so going to do it this year. My kids are grown now, so I doubt I will find someone on the tree their age (LOL) but I can still pick out three kids . . . or more

However, am I a scrooge if I ask people NOT to buy me gifts? How can I go about politely asking friends and family not to buy me things, but to instead donate to a charity or just share a special experience with me for the holidays? What do you do? Send out a pre-holiday “No Gifts Please” announcement card? It seems almost a backwards-ly selfish act.

buys cards and small gifts from organizations who help people engage in crafts to support themselves or their community.
Small useful items like a hand painted coffee mug or a handwoven straw hat.
It’s like a double gift.