Christmas and Gifts

Can we talk about Christmas for just a minute here?  How about that I am not excited for Christmas at all?  We'll just put it this way, my love language is not gift giving.  I'm not good at it.  I don't enjoy it.  And I'm sure I've offended at least everyone I know by my lack of gift-giving--it's not that I forgot your birthday/anniversary/first day of school or whatever else.  I remembered.  I just don't think to buy gifts.

But for Christmas I know I have to buy gifts.  So I try. I do.  Really, I know it doesn't seem like it, but I do.  This year, I've decided to make all my gifts for my family.  I tried to think of something to buy for each of my siblings but I couldn't.  Buying things means I have to think of something they need or want and I don't live close enough to any of them to really know without the ever-tactful "I don't talk to you often enough to know what you really want so I'm going to just ask you," so a few nights ago I decided to handmake all my gifts this year.  I find that while handmade gifts are typically less useful than the store-bought thing you really wanted, they show more effort and care, like "I made this for you because I thought you would like it and I want you to know that I care."  So, family, that is why you are all getting handmade gifts this year--because i think they show more thought and effort.  And not just because I'm cheap.