by Natalie Ivanov

Created on: September 24, 2009   Last Updated: October 07, 2009

Christmas is no longer a time of loving, sharing and celebrating the birth of Christ. Christmas has become a time for people to spend a lot of money on unwanted, unnecessary and sometimes really awful gifts. What happens after Christmas is the shops experience many feet through their doors of people returning or exchanging gifts. As a father, exactly how many pairs of socks and how many ties can you keep in your cupboard?

[i] Christmas socks are the worst. You can only wear them for one week a year without looking silly, and as a result they last for years! In the end you can end up with a whole drawer full of them! All you moms, are you ready to open up that coffee shop with all those sets of coffee and tea cups?

One of the most common gifts to be returned or exchanged, after Christmas, is clothing. People shop for clothing as gifts as they have no idea of what else to get for someone. They go into a clothing store without knowing the taste, style, or size of the person they have in mind. We all know that children grow every second of every day and the age of the child does not always depict the size of the child. The stores mark the clothing according to the children's ages, mistake number one. So more often than not you have to take the child's clothes back to the store to get it exchanged for a bigger size. If you will insist on buying clothes for children it is always a good idea to buy something one or two sizes larger. At least then they can grow into the clothes rather than having to return them to the store when they are too small.

The next problem is that everyone has different tastes in clothing. Grandparents buying clothing for teenagers is not usually a good idea because teenagers like branded clothing and perhaps Gran and Gramps do not know which ones to get. They may go for the cheaper uncommon brands that the teenager will never wear, so that gets returned.

It may even be your husband or your wife, or even your boyfriend or girlfriend that did not listen to your subtle hints during the course of the year, instead they choose to buy you an item of clothing that you would not be seen dead in. You may have even put on a couple of inches over the festive season and you just can't get into those skinny jeans or that tight-fitting blouse. Then it is time to go back to the shops to get the size that does fit you or even try and convince the shop keeper that you actually don't like what was given to you and can you exchange it for something that you

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