lol what a child he was.... anything shiny. But I bet you looked fab even if you were green around the gills.
champagne always makes me feel nasty. Great going down but hideous aftereffects.

I should bore you with my courthouse wedding.. it was bad. Real bad. Another time maybe. lol

then there was the Christmas he gave me a ring with 7 teensy diamonds in it.... in front of his parents!! I didn't know what to think! "Is it an engagement ring? Is it real? Is it a joke?" I really didn't know what it meant... you don't usually give an engagement ring in front of an audience unless the receiver really knows what's going on - but he was not on one knee and everybody was staring at me... as if they were waiting for an answer.... It was a "guess we could maybe be engaged later" ring.... ha ha ha

but in front of your parents? with no explanation?

Melaniedoggy's mom gives the worst Christmas ever. She has disappointed everytime with crappy 'gifts' that she gets at bingo. Last year was an ugly plastic picture frame without a picture. The year before was a 48" x 36" Green Bean Packers blanket.

The first Christmas I spent with her people was horrifying! I was up most of the night before baking pies, Hoppin John, Stuffing, Gravy, And drunken turkey. I take pride in my holiday table. We showed up at 10:00 and exchanged hand selected well thought out expensive gifts for a crappy dollar store Christmas themed serving platter. Then, They started their part of dinner. Two cans of corn, Instant mashed potatos and a sack of stale store bought rolls. If that wasn't bad enough, They never returned one of my pot lids and said that it had been thrown out when they moved because they didn't know whose it was.

The worst ever though was my ex-mother in laws version of Christmas. She fed me Turkey roll, Canned bisquits, Canned vegetables, Canned gravy, and Canned cranberries. I ate alone. As god is my witness, I sat at the table alone and ate Christmas Dinner because they were on some weird diet and my ex was prego and nautious.

Melaniedoggy about pooped herself the Christmas we spent at my people's house. Everything was absolutely perfect. Lots of presents, especially for the little kids. Cash and booze for the big kids.(me) And enough food to feed many starving Ethiopian families. For three days straight! She just didn't understand why I was freaking out about Christmas until I showed her a real one.

Now, She lets me do my thing and I don't have to invite her family. They are resentful because of it but, One perfect Christmas day is worth 364 days of them hating me.

oh, that's horrible!

that gal sounds like a gal I used to work with. Anytime they had an exchange at work, she insisted they have one of those nasty gift exchanges. Where you open a gift, next person opens a gift and decides to keep it or TAKE the gift the first person opens, and so forth... and the gift she brought for the exchange? a bag of junk from the dollar store! She loved taking the nice gifts and sticking someone with the crap she bought... nice, uh! Actually think gleeful was more like it!

Maybe people could adopt the notion that being together as a family is more important then showing how wealthy you are and breaking the bank for gifts nobody likes anyway.

Christmas and all family get togethers should be a time for eachother. And one of the things that would be great is to bring something to the party and with everything that is brought create a wild diner. And then a can of gravy or a pack of dried mashed potatoes might even save the day!!!

And no, I don't like celebrating St. Nicolasday or Christmas, or Valentines day, or birthdays, when it means that people are being talked down for not being able to find the right gifts for the snobs who already have a good taste and can buy anything their hearts desire!!!!

Anna I totally understand where you're coming from. But I think the point of these thread stories is not the amount spent on the gift but the complete lack of thought on the part of the person giving the gift.

To me gift giving means getting someone something that they would appreciate but would not necessarily purchase for themselves. By that I mean something that they just couldn't justify getting for themselves when their money could go to better use on their bills. One of the best gifts my wife got for me was a shaving cream dispenser that heated the shaving cream. Feels great when shaving. Anyway it was only like $15 and definitely not a necessity. But she knows how much I hate shaving and that something like that makes it a much better experience. That, to me, made it a better gift than any high-dollar toy.

If someone bought me a joke trophy from the dollar store because they thought it would get a grin & giggle from me then I'd take that over a DVD player from someone who just bought it to give something.

And thanks, manic, for the hug to my 16 year old self. Just to clarify though I didn't get those girly gifts. My sister got them for my birthday.

OH! Christmas my senior year in high school was memorable though!

Christmas was fast approaching and we didn't have a tree yet. We ALWAYS had a tree. Even in the years where my mom was a single mother and we had to get one of the left over trees on Christmas eve.

My sister had long since moved out on her own and would be spending Christmas with her boyfriend's family. I figured mom was a little down so I let the tree thing lay for a while.

Anyway I noticed that there weren't any gifts either. So I finally asked my mom about the tree around December 20th or so. She said "Oh we're not getting a tree or gifts this year because we're going to go see Grandma and Grandpa in Texas."

I'm thinking in my head "SWEET!" so I ask when we're leaving and I get the reply "Oh. It's just your step-father and I going."

That's how I found out that I was going to be spending my 18th Christmas alone. Mom hadn't even thought to let me know ahead of time. I think she was thinking that my step-ass would do it.

Luckily a girl I had dated (Linnea my "ewww" girl ) heard about this and her mother told me that I would be spending the day with them. It was a bit awkward but better than being alone.

Man. My teen years sucked now that I think about it.

My mother was a child of divorce in the 40's when not many people were divorcing. She has always hated xmas and if we do celebrate it it is usually a couple days before or after the event. Usually though she is not happy unless she's had a huge tantrum. Growing up I used to dread xmas not because of the gifts but because of all the emotions flying.

I want to have xmas with Janetdoggy's family. The food and good cheer sound exceptionally wonderful. As a grownup now I try to provide a good xmas but I'd still settle for Janetdoggy's deal.

Again Tofu I wish I could have saved you from those xmas times of yore. Another hug here seems to be needed

Sounds like we all need deep therapy to recover from the xmas celebrations of the past.

Oh I have to add this...... One xmas just myself, my husband and daughter celebrated xmas. Hubby had worked the 7pm -7am shift at the hospital the night before. So our xmas would not officially begin till about 3 or 4 pm after he had slept.
I prepared the usual, turkey, dressing etc... then decided it was a GREAT day to touch up my highlights in my hair. Unfortunately my regular brand of color was not in the house so I used an offbrand I had in the back of the closet. It had the same hair color etc why not?

Well My hair turned bright ORANGE. Flaming. I was crying... at about that same time I had a butter rum cake going and the icing is a butter melt with the rum added on the stove top . I was in the bathroom screaming over the hair when the smoke alarm went off and the kitchen cabinets were on fire from the butter rum melt. Well you can imagine the chaos... I managed to put out the fire but there was a black haze all thru the house, my cabinets were scorched and my microwave door melted.
After cleaning the kitchen one of my gay guy friends who happened to be a hair dresser called me to wish me a merry happy xmas and he gave me the solution to fix the hair issue..... now keep in mind... no hair saloon is open on xmas day. Not many drugstores or even Walmarts are open. I drove around the neighborhood and finally found a Walgreens to buy the right green ash shade to fix the orange. I had to be at work the next am at 645 am so It had to be fixed that day.
It was a memorable xmas.......... I will say that and nobody here has let me live that one down. And hubby slept thru the entire kitchen /hair event... unbelievable!
Lesson here
Never use an off brand hair color
Never multitask on a holiday with cooking and hair coloring
Always keep baking soda handy
NEVER use water on a grease fire.

My Christmas present last year was a husband.
He was on clearance...

Would it be appropriate Kitty in your case to say you get what you paid for here?
Hindsight . Nothing like armchair counselors. lol
I hope you have that situation under control and as I told Arc, I wish you and he the very best. If you are settled in Brazil by xmas send us all a happy photo of the two of you. If you need a handy rolling pin or cast iron skillet I would be happy to donate.

I overpaid.

Did you need a receipt for the return?

Yes, and unfortunately I seem to have misplaced that...
so sending him back is difficult.

First things first. Grandma makes bank. Actually, She is upper middle management with citibank and is in no way hurting for money. Let's just say that she is in the top 2% of Americans that can qualify for a new car lease.

Like tofu said, It's not the gift, It's the thought and the effort behind the gift. It's not like I'm expecting a freakin' SONY. I just hate getting MUDFLAPS! It means that I was not important enough to make an effort. I consider it an insult.

I was raised in the South by a middle class single mom. Etiquette is what really seperates the haves and the have nots. Not money. How many people do you know that can set a formal table properly for a three course meal? I can sit at any table with any class of people and not embarass my mother. Maybe that makes me a snob. Is it too much that I'm disappointed by people with no class? Family or not, There is no excuse for being a bad host. If I make arrangements to have people at my house, I feel it is my duty to be a gratious host. Especially at Christmas.