53 days until Christmas

OH MY!  When you see that countdown everywhere you look, you know you should start organizing lists and finding some Christmas cards (do people even send those out anymore?) get some shopping done.  But procrastinators like me, for example, think that if they get prepared for the unnerving and overwhelming holidays ahead of time, then what will we worry about at the last minute?  Actually I have started shopping for the kids and Don and I have talked about putting up some Christmas lights.  No, not just the little Charlie Brown Christmas tree I usually plop on a little tiny table and stack the gifts underneath, in my Scrooge like fashion.  This year he wants to put lights on the outside of the house and festive nonsense like that....the kids will love it and Consumers Energy will love the increase in my light bill.  I'm sorry.  I try not to be so Bah Hum Bug, but to me the holidays are TOO commercialized and the only thing that making such a huge deal about Christmas is spending so much money on gifts and decorations and etc etc etc, when the whole point was to celebrate Jesus' birthday and spend time with the family, not buy them off with some expensive and outrageously priced gifts or stuff them with so much food until they feel ill.  I know my oldest child thinks I am SO boring, by not cramming dozens and dozens of the latest crap under the tree that they advertise on television for us to get poorer by purchasing or what the other kids say is cool.  TRYING and the key word would be trying to please your children and make them happy with material stuff is doing way more harm than good to our kids.  The kids just keep wanting more JUNK they don't need and they don't appreciate it.  They end up losing it, breaking it, giving it away, SELLING it......all the while we are paying for it on the credit card statement for the next year or so. 
Many families cannot afford anything for Christmas, because they lost their home, many lost their jobs and most of us Americans are doing our best to live paycheck to paycheck, so when there is this holiday season that comes along and we as parents are expected to provide for our kids extra stuff because it has come to be expected, many parents feel inadequate because they simply CANNOT afford it. 
Families with spoiled kids and the means to continue to do so this holiday season, would be doing the world a service to teach their children that life and enjoying it is NOT about what you have, but who you have in your life and they should have their children GIVE to other families instead of receive this year.  Clean out their closets and toy boxes and buy for families who wouldn't have a Christmas otherwise.  Giving truly feels better than receiving....