Two years ago, we tried something new. It was back before I started budgeting for Christmas gifts after Christmas of 2013.  I had added up how much we spent on Christmas gifts that year and was depressed by the rather large number. Then I added that to the amount we spent on Birthday, Mother’s Day, and Father’s Day gifts. I had just been telling Andy that I felt like the holiday’s had become too much about the gifts. It’s all about what you spend, how much you receive, and not the spirit of giving like it should be. Armed with this new financial data to back up my moral objection to all the gift buying, we decided came up with an idea. One of our goals for the … More…