The Giving (Christmas) Spirit

Now that the Christmas season has past (or maybe it last until the New Year), I'd like to take some time to reflex on my experience.

I have trouble purchasing gifts for people for a number of reasons.
1) I don't like crap. To clarify, I don't want things I don't need and therefore find it hard to purchase something for someone when I think they don't necessarily need it.
2) I hate shopping
3) I think Christmas and life in general is too commercialized. We have too much stuff.
4) I don't feel good about buying items from most companies but don't feel educated enough to know where to shop.

So, this year I really didn't buy much and what I bought was small and simple. I bought the most stuff for my sister and she picked it all out and I wrapped it. She is 11

But then on the 24th I watch Santa Clause II on the Disney channel at my husband's grandma's house. At one point in the movie Tim Allen is at this lame teacher party and he decides to use his magic to make gifts appear for all the guest. These gifts turn out to be things that the teachers had wanted in their youth. All were excited and the party went from dull to fun. The lesson I learned from this scene is that people like presents. People like to received gifts, it makes them feel loved and it makes them happy. So although I'm not the kind of person who likes gifts most people do. I became sad that I didn't come up with more thoughtful gifts for my friends and family.
Maybe this movie tricked me into buying back into the consumerism life, but is it really that bad to buy presents for people you love? Just because they may not need the gift doesn't mean I can't buy it anyway.
I talked about this with my husband and he disagreed. He said someone needs to take a stand against consumerism. While I agree with him, I'm still sad and next year I plan to think ahead of time and purchase nicer gifts for friends and family.
Maybe I'm weak, but it's not like I'm poor and can't afford gifts. I just feel like I've been lazy about it.

So besides this little dilemma I have the holiday was nice. In retrospect I feel like I saw so many people but didn't get much quality time. I don't really know how anyone in my family is doing. I've decided to write nice New Year letters to everyone, maybe they'll write back and I'll get to hear more about their lives.

My husband and I are also debating if we should come out to see family next Christmas. It's of course 365 days away from now so who knows, maybe we will live in home state again next year. But I think it would be more fruitful to visit with friends and family without all the holiday rush going on.
We also invited everyone to come visit us in the Midwest, so hopefully that will take the burden off us always doing the traveling.

I hope everyone else had a nice holiday experience.