I'm excited!!!......already bought and wrapped loads.........and am waiting for some online stuff i ordered to be delivered....i'd have the tree up now if mr sponge wasn't such a victor meldrew...

I would have been more excited if I had not just spent an arm and a leg on my car

But that apart, yes I am beginning to get a little excited..

 love christmas everyone welcome at our house 

I'm so on top of it this year I feel smug. I've got deliveries from Lakeland, Amazon, John Lewis and pret a porter (that was for me) coming next week and then I'm done present wise 

I'm sooooooooooooooo excited!

 

I've been christmas decoration shopping today. That always gets me in the mood!

 

I'm always excited about Christmas....put the first of many trees up this week....ok, so it was shop window display at work, not home, it does look spectacular though....we really went to town with it!!

 

Have been buying pressies for a while and have a list of cakes and puddings to make for gifts too.....lovely!

 

This Xmas will a more sedate affair than normal following the death of MrB's Dad last weekend, obviously, will be very strange without him and his peculiar ways that always made us laugh ...I am sure we will still have a lovely day though....he would hate to think of us not celebrating as he loved the day too....so we will raise a glass to him and get on and enjoy the day.

 

 

Mrs B  I was just thinking about you yesterday, condolences to you all 

Mrs. B  It's our first Christmas too without my lovely father-in-law. He died on December 30th last year. My mother-in-law has been amazing through it all (she has got all my kids with her spending the night now), but I do see my husband having the occasional wobble over it.

I hadn't even thought about his absence this Christmas till just now though. It does put a dampner on things but the kids will see us all through it.

My condolences to you and your family x

I had such a busy halloween that ive not got into xmas mode yet. I need to start to focus on it... then i will be excited

 

It's a shame I can't thumbs down this thread.

I can't stand Christmas. All that build up for a couple of hours gorging on one day, then all over.

It's just one big commercial event that starts in August. I think any form of Christmas talk, advertising, shop presentations should be banned until the first week of December.

 

The people I feel sorry for are those who are really struggling, who may feel pressured into taking out loans or credit cards to purchase all the unnecessary items for that one day. It's going to be tough for many.

 

Although I don't like the whole Christmas event, I do however buy presents (only to keep the peace in the family), but the best thing about my family is that we have always had, and keep to a set budget which is £25 per person. We have done this for decades which keeps your outlay to a minimum, it also helps the members of the family who don't have as much money as me. If you want something that costs more than £25, then two or more members club together and buy a joint present.

 

I never ask for anything for Christmas and generally don't get anything. If I want something I buy it. I do tend to find that I get some money in an envelope, which I spend in the sales where I can purchase all of the items at much reduced cost to pre Christmas prices, and get more for my money to boot.

 

Christmas cards, never send them, and I have told all my friends and family. I instead make a donation to a charity with the money I were to spend on cards. Plus it's far more green to do it my way.

 

Christmas decorations, not in my house. Don't own any, don't ever intend to buy any either.

 

False sentiment and predictable Christmas parties. In the run up to Christmas holidays the number of people mincing around the office wishing everyone seasons greetings, who normally work give you a grunt at best. The Christmas parties, my favourite bit, watching people who should know better getting off with each other (normally married or attached), and yes I hold my hands up I have been indiscreet with a couple of married women. For some reason people seem to think they are single again and can sleep around - bizarre.

 

 

But for all those who enjoy the 25th December, I hope it's all you wish for and you get everything your heart desires (just because I don't like it I don't see why others should not). Me, I will be looking forward to the morning of the 1st January, it's as far away from it all you can get.

 

 

....

Mainly agree although the first week in December is too early.

Absolutely LOVE LOVE LOVE Christmas!!!!!!!  It's my favourite time of year, and my other half likes it too, and my family, and most of us have a week to ten days off work, and we stick the decorations and tree up on 1st December, and we go Christmas food shopping and pressie shopping around mid November, and start writing the Christmas cards out in late November.  We have some family and a few friends overseas, and we gets the cards and gifts sorted for them before 1st December so we can post them early.

 

I LOVE decorating the house and decorating the office where I work, and there is always someone in our road who has a mince pies and sherry get-together.  And lots of the homes in the street are covered in lights...   And the excitement that the kids feel is wonderful!

 

It's not just about the DAY: It's about the whole season, and the feel-good feeling that you get, and the cosy snug evenings watching Christmas films, (all through December) and coming home from town in the late frosty evenings.  The whole period from late October through to late December, is my FAVOURITE time of year, and I love the whole festive season. 

 

One of my colleagues at work has a boyfriend she has been with for 5 years, and lived with for 3, and he HATES it, and refuses to have a tree up, or a SINGLE decoration, and yet she desperately wants some up... So just because HE doesn't want it, they don't have a tree or decorations....    That would NEVER happen with me.  Any man would  not last five minutes in a relationship with me, if he tried to deprive me of Christmas!  A relationship with a Christmas hating man would NOT work.    I never can fathom why anyone hates such a lovely time of year... All i can put it down to is that they must have had parents who hated it, and/or grown up in a family who didnt celebrate it much

 

And it's rubbish that you have to spend a lot of money...and get stupidly in debt.. we have had lean Christmasses for the last 3 or 4 years because of the recession, and have never ever really spent a lot.....and the kids in the family are intelligent enough and well brought up enough to know that it's not always possible to spend 100s of pounds.  We have had really enjoyable Christmasses for years, on a modest budget.

 

Methinks that the type who get loads in debt for Christmas are the type that get loads in debt for ANYthing, at ANY time of year, and not just Christmas... so the disdain for Christmas (from some,) is misguided imo... The people who spend stupidly at Christmas, spend ALL the time....to have the best car, to get the best tv, to get designer clothes etc etc... so when people imply that Christmas is always so 'commericalised' and you must have to get into shed loads of debt to enjoy it,  and that people are fake at Christmas and so on and so so, leaves me bemused to be honest.  I genuinely feel sorry for people who loathe and despise Christmas, as much as people who loathe it appear to feel contempt for people who enjoy it!  Still, different horses for different courses eh?!

 

 HO HO HO!!! 

I posted one like this this morning I am very excited!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I like Christmas 

 I never can fathom why anyone hates such a lovely time of year

 

Cupcake. Have you ever stopped to think that it just might not be a happy time for some , due to what possibly could've happened through their lives or that year . Not everyone likes to be hijacked into Christmas   

^ yes, always. i still choke back tears every year when I put up my tree, and occasionally shut myself in the bathroom and let myself have a darn good sob. Then I pick myself up and carry on with a determined resolve to honour those that I've lost & still miss, the best way I know- by thoroughly enjoying Christmas, they would want me to. I eat their favourite foods, watch their favourite films, hum their favourite songs.. For everyone who struggles during the festive season, please know that much heartbreak & loss is hidden behind jolly smiles, so although it may not seem like it sometimes, many of us do understand and we will respect your feelings

At my home town today I found a silver band palying Christmas Carols outside the town hall. I kid you not.

 

Interesting post up there ^^^ Au contraire! I was brought up in a God fearing family who went for all that stuff. Mrs Jer was of the opposite camp and educated by German Palatine nuns. So perhaps not a surprise that we've both escaped.

However it's your cash and you are free to do with it, whatever you want.

The best thing about the three week Christmas is that we are able to get a lot of work done. It's a great time to write, plan, and calculate, since we are unlikely to be interupted. Christmas Day sees the extended family meet at a hotel and exchange small gifts, but that's our lot.

 

I love xmas but I can't even start to be excited about it til I at least start my xmas shopping   I think I'm a bigger kid than my own kids when it comes to all things xmas!  I really need to start buying presents soon though, I'd usually be near enough done by now but haven't even started.

Parents like Father Christmas need to think ahead........But.....Christmas should not be excited about until at least the 1st December when the Advent Calenders go up.....

Omg! Advent calenders

I have an advent tree too!

Keep your hands off it's twiglets til the first of December!!!!!!

wouldn't dream of it!

I can't wait this year. Last year was the 1st without my dad but it was also my 1st with my son. He was too little to take it all in but this year he's sooo looking forward to Santa coming 

48 sleeps to go! I played my glee Christmas album this morning, I'm so excited, I think it was the heavy frost that put me in the mood! I also changed my ringtone to deck the rooftop Cagney, oh I bet you will have a fun time with your son this Christmas, I'm excited for you!

There's quite a few xmas trees up here already  There used to be an elderly woman near us who always put her tree up at midnight on Halloween and she had done that as long as I can remember.  That was fine, she was always known as the first to have the tree up, some people took the piss but most thought it was funny.  Then her own kids and neighbours started joining in on her tradition and before you knew it there was a dozen trees up on halloween night and even more within the first week of November.

 

I get a little over excited near the end of November and usually want to put mine up by 25th Nov but try to hold out til the 1st.

I am now the lights I've bought for my cherry tree have arrived.  If I start pestering Mr Cinds to put them up now, they might actually get put up in time for Christmas.......... next year 

still a bit early tbh....and I am working this Christmas day...though it is only a few hours, I will have Christmas morning @ home, and should be back home again by early evening, so I'm hopeful that my Christmas dinner will be made for me and ready upon my return, along with large amounts of alkihole!!!

It's way, way too early to be thinking about Christmas - it's only early November!  I'll start thinking about the dreaded day on about 20 December at the earliest. 

1] What an insensitive generalisation.   you have absolutely no idea why some people hate the Xmas season at all.. maybe they once loved it but all it does now is serve to remind them of times gone by never to return and all who have passed and also reinforces to them that they are all alone now... all this as people around them and the media shove 'it's family and friend time' down their gullets wherever they turn . . ever thought of that?

 

2] again another gross generalisation. .I am pleased for those who love the season, so long as they don't shove it down my throat and I try not to bah humbug too much around them..

 

Sometimes I think people type stuff without actually thinking thru how thoughtless the things they say can be ..

oh and I think it's very wrong to start celebrating Xmas before Remembrance Sunday has passed.. so ner