On 2014-04-10 1:50 PM, Moe DeLoughan wrote:

>
> It reminds me of my brother's family and their reaction to our family
> gathering at Christmas. Being a huge family, it is our family's practice
> to only give presents to non-immediate family members under the age of
> eight. Kids between eight and eighteen get their gifts from their
> parents, but the rest of the family is not expected to give them
> anything. We all grew up under this practice and have no problem with it
> - except for my oldest brother's kids. They were incredibly rude about
> it, and he let them get away with it. Finally, one year he announced his
> family would no longer participate, because it didn't make sense to meet
> with the family if the family wasn't going to give his kids presents. A
> lot of eyebrows were raised, but nobody tried to talk them out of it.
> Now, two decades later, he and his kids complain that they have been
> 'excluded' from the rest of the family, as well as being 'singled out'
> by not being given presents. They conveniently forget it was their
> decision to break away - we just didn't try to talk them into staying.
>
> **** 'em. Christmas is a happier event without that bunch of complaining
> ingrates.


I know the feeling. We used to give Christmas presents and birthday
presents to 12 nieces and nephews. Only one uncle, who had no kids,
sent him a birthday present faithfully. Sometimes he got one other
birthday present. He got Christmas presents from my brother (wives and
kids collectively). I didn't expect one gift from each cousin. I would
have been content with one present from each family. The concept of
exchanging gifts resulted in us buying and delivering or sending 24
gifts and, in exchange, our son got 4 or 5.

They year that none of the others bothered with his birthday was the
year I was announced we were not buying Christmas gifts for the kids. I
had discussed it with my mother and she had suggested that at the family
gathering we would do the $5 gift thing. That worked for me.

Wouldn't you know that the SiL with the most kids was the one who tried
to dump on me for being the Scrooge. She actually whined that it was
unfair to her and my brother. One brother and I only had buy one gift on
behalf of our kids, one had to buy two and she had to buy four.

For years I had been buying four birthday gifts for her kids and four
Christmas presents for her kids, and they bought one Christmas gift and
didn't even bother with a birthday present for my son. Yet she was the
one who complained about unfairness. I had never even considered that
he should get one present from each cousin. One from each family would
have been perfectly fine.

I did the math.. I figured that at the time were were spending on the
average about $25 on each present. That meant that I was spending $600
total on Christmas and birthday presents for nieces and nephews. Our
son got three presents the year I cut it off. Her four kids were
getting a total of $200 in presents while they spent about $25 on our
son. The gift exchange meant I was spending $5 on behalf on my son and
she would be spending $20.... less than she would have been spending on
one present. She was saving at least $100 on presents. Knock of the $20
for the $5 gift exchange and he is ahead by $80.... but still whining
about the unfairness.