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Christmas

I feel free!

(54 Posts)
jobieP Sun 01-Dec-24 13:12:53

I have sent out some messages that I am stopping sending Christmas cards. It now costs £4.25 just to send 5 cards second post. It has become a chore

Calendargirl Sun 01-Dec-24 15:52:26

I gave up sending unnecessary cards a few years ago, but I had warned people in the previous year’s card that I was stopping.

Still send a few to ageing friends and relatives, but will reduce in the fullness of time, ‘natural wastage’.

CountessFosco Sun 01-Dec-24 15:58:33

£2.80 stamp for each overseas card is positively outrageous. Have just completed an on-line message instead of cards = pity.....

keepingquiet Sun 01-Dec-24 16:25:59

I paid for overseas cards. I probably won't get any back. I'm not sure how long we will be carrying on sending cards. It does seem to be dying out.

I remember as a child so many cards arriving every day at my home. I loved reading the ones people continued to send my mum in her old age.

I think it is sad, but there you go...

Ziggy62 Sun 01-Dec-24 16:46:22

Yes I sent message last weekend

BlueBelle Sun 01-Dec-24 16:53:04

It’s so sad I used to love the excitement of cards plopping on the doormat will probably send less this year and each year till it is them or me that's gone

NotAGran55 Sun 01-Dec-24 17:12:57

I only send cards these days to a few people who don’t have an email address.
Otherwise I send greetings using the charity site appropriately called Don’t Send Me Card, donating to my favourite charity.

I use it for birthdays and other assorted occasions, and love it when I get one back.

LadyInBlue Sun 01-Dec-24 17:22:24

Today I posted the last Christmas cards I will ever send. I put a little note in each telling them I was now going to donate the money I would have spent on cards to The British Lung Foundation in my late husband's name.

Over the last five years they have got less and less as friends and relatives have died but I still had a few people I send cards to.

The end of another tradition.

kittylester Sun 01-Dec-24 17:27:10

I love getting Christmas cards so will keep sending - admittedly to fewer and fewer people - but that's natural wastage as CalendarGirl said.

Witzend Sun 01-Dec-24 17:38:12

We still send them - though fewer each year, what with people dying off, plus I stopped sending to a few very far-flung people we haven’t seen for years and almost certainly never will again.

I like receiving them - they form part of our decorations, blu-tacked to a few vertical surfaces.

I’m quite sure that the two couples I know well who stopped sending cards a few years ago, didn’t stop because of the cost - they’re all very comfortably off - but because they just couldn’t be bothered to write them any more. Which is fair enough, but it might be nice if they just admitted it, instead of turning it into a virtue-signalling statement about saving the planet and (one couple anyway) donating the money to charity, instead.

Maggiemaybe Sun 01-Dec-24 18:43:46

It’s up to every individual of course, whatever makes us happy. There’s no point in doing something that you see as a chore. I for one love sending them and seeing cards around the house at Christmas, so I’m glad my friends and family still do them. I always buy mine direct from charity shops and most of the ones I get benefit charities too. We hand deliver most of them, but I don’t think the cost of a second class stamp is that bad, considering what we get for our 85p.

The estimate is that one billion Christmas cards are sold in the UK annually. So it’s not really a dying tradition.

Retread Sun 01-Dec-24 20:17:18

I've gone back to bygone days ... I hand Christmas cards to my close friends and family when I see them in the run up. The rest get a phone call or a text.

Floradora9 Sun 01-Dec-24 21:57:56

I would feel free if we could just skip to about the 5th. of January. I hate this time of year it brings back so many memories and regrets.

Cabbie21 Sun 01-Dec-24 22:51:45

I shall post quite a few and deliver others. I send more online these days too. I like to keep in touch with people I used to work with, or friends from where we used to live.
What I do find weird is the handing out of cards eg at choral society, ( other groups are available) by some to certain people who are considered friends. So why am I not considered a friend?
My church choir is very small, so it is not a hardship to be inclusive of everybody.

Cateq Mon 02-Dec-24 12:37:39

I read an article that it could be cheaper to buy a flight to mainland Europe and post your cards from there than send them from here.

knspol Mon 02-Dec-24 12:40:25

Certainly send far fewer these last few years. Many go to people I rarely see maybe will never see again but they bring back happy memories and I love to hear back from them with all their news. As we've lived in so many places home and abroad then it takes ages for me to write notes to enclose with them all and it is a chore but i think well worth the bother and even the cost.

loopylyn2 Mon 02-Dec-24 12:55:04

I can no longer write clearly so I do it on computer, which makes it look like a round robin. It really isn't. Each has content relating to the recipient. I suppose I could just do an email. There is an online greetings card website called Jacqui Lawson For an annual fee you can 'send' as many cards as you like.
(Is naming a business allowed)

NannieChicken Mon 02-Dec-24 13:10:34

The first card to drop through the letter box was always exciting. Now, however, it's become ridiculously expensive to send Christmas cards. We hand deliver where possible but we will be stopping after this year for all but elderly relatives who would be dreadfully sad not to get one. Several friends and cousins stopped 3 years ago. I'd much rather give the money to charity.

LovesBach Mon 02-Dec-24 13:47:46

I stood in the post office clutching stamps that had cost me over seventy pounds - and decided this was madness. Together with the cost of the cards I would be spending over £120. Most went to people I saw and kept in touch with - and I resolved then to give a decent donation to our local animal charity in future. Over the next year I put a note in birthday cards to say what I intended to do, and three years on I still feel better for doing this.

Dianehillbilly1957 Mon 02-Dec-24 14:05:07

I now only send about 4 cards now. I've informed people that I donate to an animal and human charities, a far better use of my money.

rocketship Mon 02-Dec-24 15:38:24

In Canada, our Postal workers have been on strike of almost a month with no end in sight.

Everyone will be getting lovely e-cards this Christmas season.
smile smile

Samaromo Mon 02-Dec-24 15:43:48

I will be writing 12 cards this year. Far less than I used to years ago. Only 5 will be posted and the rest handed over in person. I posted a very light small card to Poland and USA this week and couldn't believe the cost. Next year I may not bother or will include it with their presents. It seems quite sad that the habit is disappearing and must affect charities who must have lost many sales because of it.

JudyBloom Mon 02-Dec-24 16:08:07

We continue to send Christmas cards and also receive them, though not as much nowadays, alongside some online greetings. It's a shame the post office can't do a resonably priced flat rate especially for Christmas cards. It is a sad sign of the times, the personal touch disappearing.

Merhaba Mon 02-Dec-24 16:20:10

Me too, please don't send Xmas cards this year or Any other year. We've got cards we bring out every Christmas, anniversary and birthday cards, we put up every year. To me don't waste your money.. I know you care and we love our family and friends...

pascal30 Mon 02-Dec-24 16:29:36

I can remember my parents would get around 100 cards each Christmas.. I used to send about 30 in the past.. but now I send just 4 to relatives I no longer meet up with but do still care about.. The friends I see regularly no longer send cards..