Christmas is quite near, and putting your Christmas trees and other decors is quite a fun I would say. Though it is fun, buying decors is a little bit out of the budget for me. I haven't actually bought decorations for years now. I just get to have new ones whenever someone gives me decors as gifts. And now, since Christmas is near, I guess decors are a little bit expensive. A lot might say I'm too stingy, but the way the economy is now. I'd rather save the money to be used for something more important. How about you?
My dad brought his set of Christmas lights around the mid 90's, and until now it works just fine. The wreath that we have, we had it for a long time as well, in the early 90's if I'm not mistaken. We used to have a Christmas tree, but it got broken a long time ago. So basically we haven't really bought any new Christmas decorations for many years now. And I don't think we would be buying one anytime soon.
We are extravagant when it comes to Christmas decorations because we buy Christmas lights almost every year. Why so? The old lights usually have problems and I get a headache fixing them. We install 10 sets and half have problems. By the way, there are many cases of fire caused by faulty Christmas lights. But our Christmas tree is plastic that is 10 years old already. With the trimming, we reuse the old unless it is broken already particularly the shiny balls that break easily.
We seldom buy anything for Christmas anymore, although we did get a gadget from Amazon that works outside and shines pretty colored lights up onto the house, or anywhere in the yard. We tried it out, and shone the lights way up in the neighbor's pine trees, and the effect was awesome ! I am sure we will have that set up once we get closer to the Christmas holiday. When we lived out in Idaho,we always had a live Christmas tree, and for many years, I worked in the Christmas tree harvest and sales. It was bitterly cold, near zero, or even colder; but I loved the smell of the pine and fir trees. We usually would get our tree when the lot closed down on Christmas Eve, and then the kids and I would decorate it for Christmas. I think that the artificial trees are much safer, and more practical; but you just can't beat the fragrance of a genuine Christmas tree.
I think it's a general thing these years for less and less people putting up decorations for Christmas. In this age of technology, no one is really interested in what Christmas used to be. I have certainly stopped buying decorations for years now and so has most of my community.
I have noticed that too. A lot of people do not spend much for Christmas and New Year anymore. I remember when I was a kid, My aunt used to spend a lot on fire works and decorations. Even our neighbors did that, some of them spent around $4500 for anything that blows up and makes noise. But now, Christmas and New Year's Eve aren't the same as before.
Not every year, in fact I hardly go for Christmas decorations nowadays. One main reason during Christmas sometimes I am not around with my family, travelled for work purposes. But whenever I am around during the Yuletide I do buy a few decorations like the lights, flowers.
No, I still keep using the same Christmas decorations for years. If the lights work fine I don't see why I couldn't reuse them. Besides, I really like my decorations just the way they are full with many memories and more to come.
I recycle the Christmas decorations I use every year. I tend to buy a small cheap extra decoration every year but I just don't have the money for both decorations or gifts. I don't think that anyone minds.
My budget is very low and I could not afford or warrant the spending of new decorations every year to replace what I purchased the year before. What I do is buy a few each year and add to the ones that I already have. This means that the amount of decorations I can use grow each year. I look forward to buying some more this year and adding to my collection.
I come from the school of thought that questions the validity of Christmas being a pious Christian. That said and done, it would make sense to buy Christmas decor early because demand is low and so are the prices. But I tend to think that the best decor is the one that you make with your hands. You just need some dried flowers, pine cones and wrapping paper ribbons to make natural and exciting decorations that last.
No, I keep the same decoration(s) every year and put them in storage once Christmas is over. But my decorations have never really been only for Christmas, they're more like Winter decorations. I have this light-up pine tree that has glitter inside and it keeps changing colors while the glitter swirls around...I always put this on my window sill right after Halloween. I guess it could look like a Christmas tree, but really it reminds me more of a Winter/snowy tree. Then I take it down right after New Year's Eve, because right when the new year starts, I already start thinking about Spring. Besides, it would be a bit foolish for me to keep buying a regular Christmas tree every year, or any year....my cats would surely knock it down. Along with each and every ornament.
To be honest if it was up to me I would use the same Christmas decorations every year, but my partner does like to have different colours so that tends to mean we do have to buy decorations yearly. There seems to be a trend that you can't have the same colour combinations as what you had the year before, and while last year we had silver and blue, this year we have gone for the more traditional red and gold. Next year no doubt the decorations will have to be a different colour again, so what I have said is that in the January sales, we will go out and see if we can get any cheap ones and put them away. At least that way, even though we have bought 3 different lots of decorations in 3 years which to me seems excessive, at least we will have got next years at a discount price.
In our case, we don't usually buy Christmas decorations each year since the decorations were used last year are still fine and looks new so I don't see any reason to buy a new one. Unless they are ragged and won't look good if displayed. Instead of buying new Christmas decorations, why not just add the money to buy gifts right?
Yes, I do (only some things) because it's funny and it's a really important part of christmas for me and my family. Altough there are some decorrs we save yearly because they are always good, like our christmas tree!, putting your Christmas trees and different stylistic themes is a significant fun I would state.
If I was living on the mainland I would make it a family event getting a Christmas tree free from the parks that allow it, but this would be the only new Christmas decoration yearly. I like the ones my grandparents or relatives gave throughout the decades and keep them. We got a few from friends too that we use yearly until we moved to our new home now a year and when Christmas comes a year and a half. My relatives that helped us move said we got too much stuff and time to size down. Thus we donated to our thrift store in our community of Kalihi. I go shopping after Christmas and Walgreens and Walmart got a 70% off on the gone by holiday. Thrift stores has decorations too that sometimes goes on sale. These are the places you don't pay full price for they are on special sale. We now have only my favorite Aunt's gift to us one year a crocheted tree that stands about a foot and a half tall with Christmas lights in it we use for over a decade already. My Aunt is gone but her tree is here with us every year. I donated the other 2 and a half feet tall fake tree to our thrift store. Memories goes with our decorations
I would like to buy nativity scenes myself in the off season,and I would like to collect them also,because they seem to have so much meaning to me. You could even look at garage sales or thrift stores for these scenes, and see what they have as well. I think you could even leave them up all year-round for decoration and meaning in your life?
No, I don't buy it every year. My family basically takes advantage of a large portion of the previous year's decoration and just purchases one or another new thing to complement the place. I don't think it's necessary to buy annually. I consider it a kinda waste of money.
