If you’ve been reading or watching any sort of news, you’ve probably heard that supply chain shortages may affect holiday shopping this year. There still aren’t enough cargo containers to keep up with demand, and those that are coming in are being delayed due to the pandemic.
Children’s toys may see the worst of the shortages, so if you’ve got kids or grandkids in your life, you may want to start shopping early…
This year, will you shop early for holiday gifts? Tell us in the poll below. Thanks and happy shopping!
I shop all year long. My shopping for this year is completed. I dropped off gifts for several people when I was visiting in September. I have just a few which will need to be mailed, which I will do in early November.
We “shop” for “Toys for Tots” all year long. Pick up deals when we see them. Filled 3 boxes the last two years, on the way to repeat this year. It is getting more difficult to find real bargains with the supply train wrecked.
Like I tell our Grandkids “Bah! Humbug!” Then we just give them money, since they’re pretty much grown. We also try to find appropriate gag gifts.
I picked not relevant. Not exactly accurate though. We only buy gifts for the two young grand nephews and don’t go overboard.
We always have our Christmas shopping done before we leave our family around September. The wife is good that way. We like to collect gifts from our travels for our family.
Marked same as usual, but that’s early. Like to have things pretty much done before the trek to Florida. Don’t want to do last minute when we come back north for Christmas.
my answer was not in the poll so i answered “not relevant”. we give gifts to the postman, lawn cutting/snow removal crews, housekeeper, etc. but either cash or gift cards. we don’t buy for each other anymore…we don’t need anything except each other. my wife used to take her brother Christmas shopping…for his gift! then he’d act all surprised on Christmas Day. gonna be a lonely Christmas this year as my wife’s brother died last March.
What’s the point when there will be no toys on the shelves this year…
From what I’m hearing about the 100+ container ships off the Ca coast. there wont be a great Christmas till February or so they say! This pandemic has totally changed this world!
Snoopy
It’s not just Long Beach and Los Angeles ports. For many years we sailed mostly on the Chesapeake Bay and up and down the Atlantic. Now that we have our land yacht we cross over the bay mainly on the route 50 bridge. In all of the sailing years I have never seen container ships anchored in the bay waiting to be unloaded in Baltimore. A few weeks ago we counted 8 ships on the south side of the bridge and maybe more that only appeared to be specs on the horizon, we could not see north towards Baltimore due to the East bound bridge blocking our view.
I shop when my wife deems it appropriate or necessary. Normally she does all the Christmas shopping and adds my name to the label on the wrapped present as a courtesy (recognizing me for moral support?).
We toy shop for a church program for under privileged families. As of now they have not come up with a want list, it will be very interesting to see what is left on the shelves once the list comes out. For our children and son-in-law it’s usually a small gift and several Benjamin’s
Have fun shopping Joe. Those are the gifts that are the most fun and rewarding to buy as you already know.
Other than stocking stuffers I am done unless I find that extra special something. Sales in October are usually the same or close enough to save the hassle. So when November rolls around I can spend my time cleaning my house top to bottom and then decorating(very large village), baking(which is a lot of my gifts), volunteering and simply enjoying the glorious holiday season. That allows me to enjoy the real reason for the season!!!!
I put out the word out to my DIL & 2 step-daughters to get their lists to me for the grandkids (we get them one gift, from ideas from their Mom’s, & add money or gift card to equal total we spend on each). If gifts aren’t available…due to the supply chain issues…will do money/gift cards and/or IOU’s on the gift. Not going to stress about it.
My thoughts exactly~ I do the everything equal too but require most of my $ gift to go to college fund. They get so much stuff all ready! They will thank us later for the help going to college.
Sad to think about a substantial amount of stuff on those ships used to be made right here – “Made in the USA”. What happened? We didn’t need ships, just trains and truckers! Here we sit and lament about massive amounts of product coming into and not out of the US. I guess cheap wins.
After years of buying gifts for my family that lives 2000 miles away, only to find them on a back shelf or sold at a garage sale when I could go to visit, I stopped buying them anything. Last year I took the money I would have spent on their presents and made a donation to ‘Toys for Tots’ in their local area instead. That’s an action I plan to continue in the future.
That sounds so familiar. I stopped that one myself when I noticed it as well. Money best spent on a nice vacation. IIMO
When my mother was alive I loved shopping for her gifts and then making her crazy when it came to saying you always wanted this. The Xmas before her death she gave out gifts that made no sense. Cheap junk I gave away but still I gave nice stuff. Now? I just tell my husband and daughter buy what you want. I do not do Xmas any more. Its a pain in the ars. Seriously. Glad I no longer deal with the holidays. IMO not yours.
Shop throughout the year for family…when I know they want/need something I look for it. If I find interesting things on my trips I buy them.
When we were visiting Four Corners outside of Mesa Verde my mothers card would not work no matter what. She gave up and decided not to buy it. I bought it and gave it to her Xmas. The look on her face was priceless. She died 4 months later. The item in question in storage waiting for our daughter to put it in her house.