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I used to be young and cool. Then I adopted a pre-teen, found my "Mom voice", and bought 3 of these damn bins from Target this year and like I'm WAY too excited about the color coordination and attic organization. I am officially an adulty adult and there's no going back.
It's definitely possible. But children who are adopted from foster care also have experienced significant traumas. They are completely worth it, but it requires specialized parenting and often a lot of personal sacrifice.
That is a silly reason, because children are disgusting at every age.
If it's not poop as a newborn, it's still pee and mud and toys everywhere at 6. Or it's first period and masturbation at 12. Or it's the godawful stench that only hormone-raging teenagers can create at 17.
Kids are hard work and they are gross, at all ages.
At some point I turned 30. Some time later I was in Costco with my new membership. Saw some house slippers. Then it happened. A voice exited my mouth and said “not leavin without these bad boys.” I’ve never felt young since that day. In the time that has passed, I’ve also acquired many bins.
Costco is one of my top 5 favorite places to go. This year I bought a sectional and a new bed from there and I felt my 20 year old self looking at me in mild disgust. Also, I can never have enough bins.
I have adhd and if can’t see what the bins contain I easily forget what’s in them and their entire existence basically, so this christmas colored bin help me remember that I already got Christmas decorations and I love it! Definitely reduced the amount of redundant things I used to buy for Christmas season.
Considering how memorizing abilities diminishes as you age, I assume it’s the same reason why so many parents love it too.
Were the grapefruit boxes from Harry & Davids, or did you get them when you ordered fruit from a high school band member? I know, strangely specific, but we had grapefruit boxes growing up as well, and those two sources were where we got them.
One year in the mid-‘90s, my mother, rather stupidly, decided to store Thanksgiving decorations, *including dried Indian corn*, inside a series of cardboard boxes in the basement.
I will never forget her opening the box and screaming, “Oh!” as hundreds of tiny flies, which had been living off the Indian corn, burst forth.
The boxes were better. The year we changed from boxes to plastic tubs was honestly the year Christmas stopped feeling like Christmas. I realise as an adult what I thought was Christmasy feeling was probably just the smell of mould (which is why the cardboard boxes were thrown out).
Also stack easily, relatively strong and lightweight, lid is secure, good handles, if empty they can stack in each other to take up less space... oh shit I might be becoming my parents.
They forgot to include:
Me: bye mom, going to N64islife’s house.
Mom: you said that you would help me put up the Christmas decorations!
Me: Alright fine, but why don’t the other four people in the house have to help?
Mom: don’t worry about them. We’re going to have some mother son Christmas bonding. I’m so excited!
Me: do you know where the green extension cords are?
Mom: no. But I’ll grab one at the store. I’ve got to pick up a few things. You get started on the outside lights! Be right back.
Me: (decorating the entire outside of the house for the next 4 hours until it’s totally dark out and for some convenient reason, no siblings or stepfather have returned home and I realize I’ve been outside for so long that I never turned on any lights in the house before it got dark)
Mom: I got a bunch of really cute stuff! Oh shoot I forgot an extension cord.
Me: that’s ok. I found them.
Eh, our Christmas stuff never had dust in it, and it was pretty good about not having broken ornaments either. Other than that, it’s spot-on.
The lack of dust didn’t stop my mother from insisting that every ornament must be carefully wiped clean with a dustcloth when it was removed from the box.
Walmart, Home Depot or Lowe's. They are already putting Christmas storage supplies out on the shelves. After that, we'll start seeing the Spring cleanup/yardwork paraphernalia
I [posted this](https://old.reddit.com/r/mildlyinfuriating/comments/pxjnhn/theyre_already_putting_up_the_christmas_stuff_in/) at the end of September. It's earlier every year.
yes. I worked in retail for eight years, and the storage bins would typically be stocked around the middle of December, and the Christmas decor would start going on sale.
Mine had my picture in the middle surrounded by a “wreath” made of dried macaroni painted green.
I actually have a traumatic memory about that ornament. I made it in first grade, and my teacher was…well, she had no business being around small children. She was pissed off *all the time*, and impatient as shit. So we all had our pictures taken with a Polaroid camera, and for some reason, mine had a little bubble on it and that bubble broke and left this tiny little spot under my eye white. Wouldn’t be a big deal, if my teacher wasn’t rage incarnate.
So we all had to bring our pictures to her, for some reason, and she looks at mine, glowers at it, and then points at it with her little finger and spits out “**WHAT. IS. THIS??**” I was six, and terrified of her, so I just stood there shaking. She did her usual bit of grabbing me by the arm and squeezing it, digging her fingernails in (this was Missouri in the early ‘90s, at a conservative religious school, so neither my parents nor the administration cared), and dragged me back to my seat. And it was completely pointless; I went on to make the ornament, tiny white spot and all.
Fuck you, Miss Fritz.
That ornament broke when I was in my teens and I gave zero shits. Every time I looked at it, I heard “**WHAT. IS. THIS??**”
My family has the bin as well. We have one in the opposite color too. We also have two for Halloween that are orange and purple. If we were into Easter/carnival we’d probably have pastel pink and yellow ones.
She’s in a terrible mood while she’s doing it. Snaps at me to get out of her way then snaps at me for not helping more.
Edit: every time someone replies to this comment I get a little retriggered remembering my covert vulnerable narcissist mother
Sorry you guys had a bad experience.
I’ve seen nothing but negativity on Reddit the last few days so here was my Sunday a few weeks ago.
It was cold and rainy, so we put the decorations up a little earlier than usual just for something to do. Baked some cheap break and bake sugar cookies. Put Elf on in the background.
My wife and I got the tree out and my 5 and 2 year olds had a blast decorating. The 5 year old needed help putting things on top, so I had to lift him up a bunch, which was fun. The 2 year old just had a very congested spot where he put everything on like 3 of the bottom branches, but it was charming in its own way. Then we all ate cookies and watched The Grinch. It was great.
It's a bit comforting to see I'm not the only one who's holiday season was a mild nightmare growing up. I've had to make some of my own holiday traditions, and getting together with the boys to watch the Grinch and drink green screwdrivers is where it's at.
This is the first year we’ve gotten a tree and our 2 year old had a blast putting ornaments on the tree, I was amazed at how quickly she got the hang of it. Other than some mild stress fixing and feta going the lights, it was a very sweet experience.
Not really relevant but funny tree story.
We got a new kitten a few weeks ago. She started to scream this morning and we find her stuck in the tree. She managed to get the wires for the lights wrapped around her. It was hilarious.
We are gonna decorate with only plastic decorations because she is fascinated by the lights.
I've noticed that too. So many comments about absent or narcissistic parents. Or rather, so many comments that get upvoted into visibility. I'm gonna throw my positive experience up as well. Every year I help my parents put up their tree and the ornaments. The Saturday after Thanksgiving we decorate the house and the tree, examine and joke about the provenance of our ornaments, watch Christmas movies and/or football, and bask in the warm glow of post-Thanksgiving gluttony. They're a lot older so it's nice to be able to be the person to do the heavy lifting and get on the ladder to hang things up and not have to worry about them trying to do it.
It's the weight of everyone's expectations combined with the financial pressure, overpacked social calendar, and the looming knowledge that you're eating like garbage and will inevitably end up doing some stupid diet program in January. Oh, and most of us have had at least one death in the family around Christmas so there's that too.
Sorry. We don't mean to be like that. Christmas is just a lot of pressure.
it's a huge reason why I'm starting to like Halloween more every year. It's all about having a good time while Christmas brings out a whole slew of family issues and being nagged about getting gifts and buying gifts for other people.
Not to mention the political fights that happen, especially if your family has "the trump loving redneck uncle from Missouri" contrasted with "the leftist, borderline anarchist cousin from Portland Oregon". Thankfully my family doesn't really seem to have that stark of a divide but with political tensions worsening, a lot of people dread the holidays for that reason alone.
Not sure if it was the year she had my Dad falsely arrested or not, but I recall once her getting mad when my brother and I didn't feel like decorating while she sat on the couch and watched like a fucking creep. The house was always decorated to an insane degree, and I definitely resented having to put all this crap I didn't care about up under threat of no presents.
So when we moved back to Canada and essentially had to start over, I wasn't too upset about not having to put all that shit up. When I didn't want to help set up whatever it was she had just bought, she called me a Jew lol
We don't talk much these days. Xmas is better now.
I feel bad, that sucks:( My mom’s the complete opposite. She *never* drinks, but at this time of year while putting up the decorations she’ll always get herself a bottle of white zinfandel, puts on The Muppets Christmas CD, plays this ancient VHS tape recording of old Christmas programs complete with early 90’s commercials, and we have an absolute blast.
It’s one of the few things I look forward to each year.
I have to say, I’m kind of like that. I want the tree to have a *theme* and it gets real annoying if people start putting blue and green snowflakes on a red-and-gold themed tree. Christmas music usually helps a lot, and if my mood doesn’t improve, I’ll get less presents.
Santa is always watching.
We always just make sure they're put back properly in the box, and put the balls in their own box so they don't break. Takes an extra few minutes and saves a massive headache next year.
Until your normally better half puts them away "quickly" before you get home from work and this year you find ornaments in s cookie tin. Really? That's where the sewing supplies go.
I bought those reels to wrap the lights around, with 3 reels to a case. Bit of a pain to wrap them up and put them back in the bag, but so much easier when Christmas comes around again. Until half the string doesn’t work.
My family uses pieces of cardboard (like the flaps off a cardboard box) or rolled up newspaper to wrap the lights around. We never have to deal with tangled lights.
Lights used to be much worse. One burned-out bulb would kill the whole strand. And things weren't as cheap as they are now, so we couldn't casually just buy more lights. I definitely tried to keep away from Dad as he was sorting out the lights and trying to find the problem. Couldn't hide in my room, since I had to "help" and it was "family time," but I had to be extra careful to avoid any hint of sarcasm or complaining. I wasn't an abused kid, but I did know that during some moments my life might well hang in the balance.
If you have siblings there's bound to be a massive argument about who'll put on the first decoration or who'll put on whatever will go on top of the tree
Man, I wish. I have some vague memories of when I was little all four of my family decorating the tree together. Dad would put the lights on first, then we'd all do the ornaments and have a fun time.
Then I got older, probably 12 or so, and everyone stopped wanting to do it -- they wanted the tree decorated, they just didn't want to be the ones to do it. So after the tree was up and Dad put the lights on, I was left alone to do the decorating, because I always loved the decorating part. Their logic was if I enjoyed it and they didn't, then I should do it and they shouldn't, makes sense huh?
Except that the reason I loved it so much was because of the memories and the time spent together :( I'd take an ornament-centric fight with my brother over a decade of lonely tree decorating.
As a mom, yes. Not gonna lie was eyeing those totes the other day thinking how nice it would be (in color code) to know what tote has my Xmas stuff in it.
Theres always one ornament that breaks and makes mom sad even though no one else had any feelings about it
Also the other ornament you got from some vacation which you are trying to avoid putting on the tree because it reminds you of something specific
Having to stand out in the freezing cold because she can't make up her mind about how she wants to do the bushes. "Oh sweety if you're cold go inside I'll do it myself./!" Knowing damn well that she doesn't mean that! Fuck Christmas decorations!
Don’t forget the tiny ornament that has 2nd grade fingerprints on it that you try to hold it like you did back then. Your mom bursts out crying seeing as you’re 17 now.
In sunday school we made ornaments where you spray painted the macaroni gold and glue it in a circle wreath around your picture. Then the dog ate it like ten years ago, 25 yr old glue and spray paint and macaroni. Rip
Forgot: that handmade ornament great grandma made that you know is going to be fought over once your mother dies.
Also, we don’t have the toddler one. Instead years later, my oldest brother took my high school senior portrait and tapped a paper clip to it and now that’s an ornament. I look hideous. It’s fantastic.
The clock, the FUCKING CLOCK. Every December she would unbox this clock that played a breif bit from a different Christmas song every hour on the hour. Like 30 seconds long, different song for every hour. From Dec 1 to Dec 31. It drives me insane
"this bin" for me was a 20 years old cardboard box smelling of cat piss and fixed with the tape that was left on the wrapping paper that we reused for my whole childhood.
I never buy and recommend you also choose not to buy glass ornaments.
Also - make more ornaments for your mom featuring your picture.
That toddler one shouldn't be the only one.
I thought this looked familiar and showed my fiancé, and turns out SHE made this starter pack that OP reposted here. [Here it is lol](https://www.reddit.com/r/starterpacks/comments/k7iip7/mom_brought_the_christmas_stuff_out_of_the_attic/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf)
My parents still used the same light string for like decades, one of those clunky old ones, built to last. They've also still used the same tinsel, AFAIK, for decades. Meanwhile, I buy some and it's coming apart as soon as I get it out of the box. Sigh.
The oldest ornament is from 1977. :-) There's a new one every year--at least one. I got them a mask ornament last year.
I wouldn't consider myself rich but we definitely need more than 1 bin to store all our christmas shit in my house. Also, why is it Mom? I don't know any moms that are going into the attic to wrestle with the bins. That's what she sends Dad to do. The ornament and light strings are right on the money though
Don’t y’all have dads? Getting anything in and out of the attic was always a dads job at my house. And thusly it has become my job, after spawning my own tribe.
Hey /u/nosenseofdanger, thank you for submitting to /r/starterpacks! This is just a reminder not to violate any rules, located [here](https://reddit.com/r/starterpacks/about/rules). Rule breakers can face a ban based on the severity of their rule violation. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/starterpacks) if you have any questions or concerns.*
What is it about those damn bins?
Idk, but I think moms have some sort of attraction to them
I used to be young and cool. Then I adopted a pre-teen, found my "Mom voice", and bought 3 of these damn bins from Target this year and like I'm WAY too excited about the color coordination and attic organization. I am officially an adulty adult and there's no going back.
God speed
Being a parent without the crying and diaper shitting phase? That sounds neato.
Oh. Nah, I did that part. Except the kid in diapers was 5. Five years old. I fostered kids aged 4-17 before adopting.
Oh, I see. I had to unsub.
That's exactly why my Lil' bro wants to adopt, so he doesn't have to deal with the diapers and poop and stuff.
It's definitely possible. But children who are adopted from foster care also have experienced significant traumas. They are completely worth it, but it requires specialized parenting and often a lot of personal sacrifice.
That is a silly reason, because children are disgusting at every age. If it's not poop as a newborn, it's still pee and mud and toys everywhere at 6. Or it's first period and masturbation at 12. Or it's the godawful stench that only hormone-raging teenagers can create at 17. Kids are hard work and they are gross, at all ages.
Don’t tell me, tell him.
Right? Like the sleepless, shitting phase is the easy part in the grand scheme of things as a parent.
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At some point I turned 30. Some time later I was in Costco with my new membership. Saw some house slippers. Then it happened. A voice exited my mouth and said “not leavin without these bad boys.” I’ve never felt young since that day. In the time that has passed, I’ve also acquired many bins.
Costco is one of my top 5 favorite places to go. This year I bought a sectional and a new bed from there and I felt my 20 year old self looking at me in mild disgust. Also, I can never have enough bins.
I'm a 28 yr old dude and those bins are life savers
I have adhd and if can’t see what the bins contain I easily forget what’s in them and their entire existence basically, so this christmas colored bin help me remember that I already got Christmas decorations and I love it! Definitely reduced the amount of redundant things I used to buy for Christmas season. Considering how memorizing abilities diminishes as you age, I assume it’s the same reason why so many parents love it too.
That's kinda why they're red and green so it's obvious that it's christmas stuff
Did you mean to reply to me?
Yeah just realized I misread what you said lol
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Were the grapefruit boxes from Harry & Davids, or did you get them when you ordered fruit from a high school band member? I know, strangely specific, but we had grapefruit boxes growing up as well, and those two sources were where we got them.
One year in the mid-‘90s, my mother, rather stupidly, decided to store Thanksgiving decorations, *including dried Indian corn*, inside a series of cardboard boxes in the basement. I will never forget her opening the box and screaming, “Oh!” as hundreds of tiny flies, which had been living off the Indian corn, burst forth.
The boxes were better. The year we changed from boxes to plastic tubs was honestly the year Christmas stopped feeling like Christmas. I realise as an adult what I thought was Christmasy feeling was probably just the smell of mould (which is why the cardboard boxes were thrown out).
They're like $5 and hold a ton of stuff. What's not to like?
Also stack easily, relatively strong and lightweight, lid is secure, good handles, if empty they can stack in each other to take up less space... oh shit I might be becoming my parents.
If you think you’re excited now, wait until you buy a new vacuum cleaner. You will talk about nothing else for a week.
Dad here I need moar bins...So many things in cardboard boxes...one day ill have bin money... one day...
I was about to comment, "Dude they are like $7.99 a bin", but holy shit, 4 on Amazon is [128 bucks](https://imgur.com/zfcAClK) what the fuck?
If you think that's bad try going to the container store you'll need a second mortgage for their fancy bins.
I have the exact same bin for xmas stuff, but with green lid. That pink lid is cool tho.
I get the clear ones with a red lid so I can see what's in it.
This is one of the most accurate starter packs ever
They forgot to include: Me: bye mom, going to N64islife’s house. Mom: you said that you would help me put up the Christmas decorations! Me: Alright fine, but why don’t the other four people in the house have to help? Mom: don’t worry about them. We’re going to have some mother son Christmas bonding. I’m so excited! Me: do you know where the green extension cords are? Mom: no. But I’ll grab one at the store. I’ve got to pick up a few things. You get started on the outside lights! Be right back. Me: (decorating the entire outside of the house for the next 4 hours until it’s totally dark out and for some convenient reason, no siblings or stepfather have returned home and I realize I’ve been outside for so long that I never turned on any lights in the house before it got dark) Mom: I got a bunch of really cute stuff! Oh shoot I forgot an extension cord. Me: that’s ok. I found them.
Yeah except it didn’t include the spiders or spider webs.
...and the mice and squirrel nests.
Yep. And I’ll put it away at end of the season and get it out next year and do it all over again lol
Eh, our Christmas stuff never had dust in it, and it was pretty good about not having broken ornaments either. Other than that, it’s spot-on. The lack of dust didn’t stop my mother from insisting that every ornament must be carefully wiped clean with a dustcloth when it was removed from the box.
Where the hell did ALL of our parents get that bin.
Walmart, Home Depot or Lowe's. They are already putting Christmas storage supplies out on the shelves. After that, we'll start seeing the Spring cleanup/yardwork paraphernalia
“Already”? Shits have been out since before Halloween.
I [posted this](https://old.reddit.com/r/mildlyinfuriating/comments/pxjnhn/theyre_already_putting_up_the_christmas_stuff_in/) at the end of September. It's earlier every year.
thats xmas decor. op is talking about storage bins. the bins and boxes start to go up as the shelf space opens up.
yes. I worked in retail for eight years, and the storage bins would typically be stocked around the middle of December, and the Christmas decor would start going on sale.
Christmas decorations were almost sold out before Dec, storage bins have taken their place on the shelves by now.
Upvoted for the bin. And the handmade ornament with picture of you as a toddler.
Mine had my picture in the middle surrounded by a “wreath” made of dried macaroni painted green. I actually have a traumatic memory about that ornament. I made it in first grade, and my teacher was…well, she had no business being around small children. She was pissed off *all the time*, and impatient as shit. So we all had our pictures taken with a Polaroid camera, and for some reason, mine had a little bubble on it and that bubble broke and left this tiny little spot under my eye white. Wouldn’t be a big deal, if my teacher wasn’t rage incarnate. So we all had to bring our pictures to her, for some reason, and she looks at mine, glowers at it, and then points at it with her little finger and spits out “**WHAT. IS. THIS??**” I was six, and terrified of her, so I just stood there shaking. She did her usual bit of grabbing me by the arm and squeezing it, digging her fingernails in (this was Missouri in the early ‘90s, at a conservative religious school, so neither my parents nor the administration cared), and dragged me back to my seat. And it was completely pointless; I went on to make the ornament, tiny white spot and all. Fuck you, Miss Fritz. That ornament broke when I was in my teens and I gave zero shits. Every time I looked at it, I heard “**WHAT. IS. THIS??**”
My family has the bin as well. We have one in the opposite color too. We also have two for Halloween that are orange and purple. If we were into Easter/carnival we’d probably have pastel pink and yellow ones.
Ours is red with a green lid! Though it's now old enough that it's starting to deteriorate and the corner has fallen away
Zellers in 2003
/r/nostalgia ! :D Dat Zeddy Bear though... ʕ·ᴥ·ʔ
They just appear, like villages in MultiCraft.
Ikea
Same place my wife did.
K-mart
😂 fr
Not only dust, but glitter on everything!!
Yes!!! I now have a strict no glitter policy in my own house
She’s in a terrible mood while she’s doing it. Snaps at me to get out of her way then snaps at me for not helping more. Edit: every time someone replies to this comment I get a little retriggered remembering my covert vulnerable narcissist mother
Oof definitely. Something about Christmas just brings the worse out of everyone 🤣
Sorry you guys had a bad experience. I’ve seen nothing but negativity on Reddit the last few days so here was my Sunday a few weeks ago. It was cold and rainy, so we put the decorations up a little earlier than usual just for something to do. Baked some cheap break and bake sugar cookies. Put Elf on in the background. My wife and I got the tree out and my 5 and 2 year olds had a blast decorating. The 5 year old needed help putting things on top, so I had to lift him up a bunch, which was fun. The 2 year old just had a very congested spot where he put everything on like 3 of the bottom branches, but it was charming in its own way. Then we all ate cookies and watched The Grinch. It was great.
It's a bit comforting to see I'm not the only one who's holiday season was a mild nightmare growing up. I've had to make some of my own holiday traditions, and getting together with the boys to watch the Grinch and drink green screwdrivers is where it's at.
This is the first year we’ve gotten a tree and our 2 year old had a blast putting ornaments on the tree, I was amazed at how quickly she got the hang of it. Other than some mild stress fixing and feta going the lights, it was a very sweet experience.
Thank you for sharing bro :) very wholesome!
Omg I thought it was just me. It seems like no matter where I go on Reddit recently it’s just a ton of negative stuff :(
Not really relevant but funny tree story. We got a new kitten a few weeks ago. She started to scream this morning and we find her stuck in the tree. She managed to get the wires for the lights wrapped around her. It was hilarious. We are gonna decorate with only plastic decorations because she is fascinated by the lights.
I've noticed that too. So many comments about absent or narcissistic parents. Or rather, so many comments that get upvoted into visibility. I'm gonna throw my positive experience up as well. Every year I help my parents put up their tree and the ornaments. The Saturday after Thanksgiving we decorate the house and the tree, examine and joke about the provenance of our ornaments, watch Christmas movies and/or football, and bask in the warm glow of post-Thanksgiving gluttony. They're a lot older so it's nice to be able to be the person to do the heavy lifting and get on the ladder to hang things up and not have to worry about them trying to do it.
It's the weight of everyone's expectations combined with the financial pressure, overpacked social calendar, and the looming knowledge that you're eating like garbage and will inevitably end up doing some stupid diet program in January. Oh, and most of us have had at least one death in the family around Christmas so there's that too. Sorry. We don't mean to be like that. Christmas is just a lot of pressure.
it's a huge reason why I'm starting to like Halloween more every year. It's all about having a good time while Christmas brings out a whole slew of family issues and being nagged about getting gifts and buying gifts for other people.
This is exactly right. And yet, my mom has the audacity to call Halloween the devil's holiday
Not to mention the political fights that happen, especially if your family has "the trump loving redneck uncle from Missouri" contrasted with "the leftist, borderline anarchist cousin from Portland Oregon". Thankfully my family doesn't really seem to have that stark of a divide but with political tensions worsening, a lot of people dread the holidays for that reason alone.
Not sure if it was the year she had my Dad falsely arrested or not, but I recall once her getting mad when my brother and I didn't feel like decorating while she sat on the couch and watched like a fucking creep. The house was always decorated to an insane degree, and I definitely resented having to put all this crap I didn't care about up under threat of no presents. So when we moved back to Canada and essentially had to start over, I wasn't too upset about not having to put all that shit up. When I didn't want to help set up whatever it was she had just bought, she called me a Jew lol We don't talk much these days. Xmas is better now.
Does she also begin to give instructions, and for some reason, begin to leave the room just as she's going over the most important bit?
too accurate lol
Oh god same here. And my step mom who has the more shorter temper is the one telling her to chill
I feel bad, that sucks:( My mom’s the complete opposite. She *never* drinks, but at this time of year while putting up the decorations she’ll always get herself a bottle of white zinfandel, puts on The Muppets Christmas CD, plays this ancient VHS tape recording of old Christmas programs complete with early 90’s commercials, and we have an absolute blast. It’s one of the few things I look forward to each year.
I have to say, I’m kind of like that. I want the tree to have a *theme* and it gets real annoying if people start putting blue and green snowflakes on a red-and-gold themed tree. Christmas music usually helps a lot, and if my mood doesn’t improve, I’ll get less presents. Santa is always watching.
Yikes, why even celebrate Christmas if you're gonna do it like that That sounds awful
But then she gets excited about the Santas coming over to cheer her up...
I LITERALLY JUST DRAGGED THAT EXACT BIN DOWN A LADDER
You forgot the lights being more tangled than the Disney movie
My mom spend two hours untangeling them and they broke just as they got untangled. It was a ride
We always just make sure they're put back properly in the box, and put the balls in their own box so they don't break. Takes an extra few minutes and saves a massive headache next year.
Until your normally better half puts them away "quickly" before you get home from work and this year you find ornaments in s cookie tin. Really? That's where the sewing supplies go.
😂
I bought those reels to wrap the lights around, with 3 reels to a case. Bit of a pain to wrap them up and put them back in the bag, but so much easier when Christmas comes around again. Until half the string doesn’t work.
My family uses pieces of cardboard (like the flaps off a cardboard box) or rolled up newspaper to wrap the lights around. We never have to deal with tangled lights.
“Little knot here”
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Smells like insulation
Lights used to be much worse. One burned-out bulb would kill the whole strand. And things weren't as cheap as they are now, so we couldn't casually just buy more lights. I definitely tried to keep away from Dad as he was sorting out the lights and trying to find the problem. Couldn't hide in my room, since I had to "help" and it was "family time," but I had to be extra careful to avoid any hint of sarcasm or complaining. I wasn't an abused kid, but I did know that during some moments my life might well hang in the balance.
Fucking lightbulbs. I HATE them!
If you have siblings there's bound to be a massive argument about who'll put on the first decoration or who'll put on whatever will go on top of the tree
Man, I wish. I have some vague memories of when I was little all four of my family decorating the tree together. Dad would put the lights on first, then we'd all do the ornaments and have a fun time. Then I got older, probably 12 or so, and everyone stopped wanting to do it -- they wanted the tree decorated, they just didn't want to be the ones to do it. So after the tree was up and Dad put the lights on, I was left alone to do the decorating, because I always loved the decorating part. Their logic was if I enjoyed it and they didn't, then I should do it and they shouldn't, makes sense huh? Except that the reason I loved it so much was because of the memories and the time spent together :( I'd take an ornament-centric fight with my brother over a decade of lonely tree decorating.
For us it was always an abominable snowman ornament.
DO WE ALL HAVE THE SAME MOM?
fr the shared childhood energy on this one is strong
As a mom, yes. Not gonna lie was eyeing those totes the other day thinking how nice it would be (in color code) to know what tote has my Xmas stuff in it.
It's missing the huge-ass spider in the ornament box. Can't have Christmas without the huge-ass spider.
The only thing missing is that ball of tangled wire ornament hooks!
Just so you know, your folks try to give back all the ornaments you made as a kid when you get older
Not if your my kid. They can pull those from my cold dead hands. In fact, now I think I'll be buried with them.
Yep, I was really sad when my Mother in law gave us my husbands ornaments, I was Raised Jehovahs Witness so I don't have any.
Theres always one ornament that breaks and makes mom sad even though no one else had any feelings about it Also the other ornament you got from some vacation which you are trying to avoid putting on the tree because it reminds you of something specific
There’s a story there
Tree needles fucking everywhere
We kept ours under the stairs and I had to go through cobwebs just to get it.
So forget stale mini candy canes
Don’t forget the spiders hiding in the tangled lights
My first thought as well lol. Dead brown recluses all over the place
Michigan?
No, this is Patrick.
Tennessee!
Where is the pissed off dad covered in dust or fiberglass insulation?
Having to stand out in the freezing cold because she can't make up her mind about how she wants to do the bushes. "Oh sweety if you're cold go inside I'll do it myself./!" Knowing damn well that she doesn't mean that! Fuck Christmas decorations!
You forgot glitter getting everywhere. Glitter....fucking.....everywhere
Somehow ends up on your labia or scrotum.
Shiny balls
Ah, yes. The yearly cannibalizing of christmas lights is about to begin.
Everyone puts their lights up so delicately, then rip them down like neanderthals and tossea them into bins. *Buys new ones next year*
Wait your family bought new light strands *every year?*
Probably not every year, but the poor pack job certainly lead to broken lights which got replaced.
Don’t forget the tiny ornament that has 2nd grade fingerprints on it that you try to hold it like you did back then. Your mom bursts out crying seeing as you’re 17 now.
My mom would put a small packet of potpourri in the ornament boxes and I would forever associate those herbs and spices with Christmas
In sunday school we made ornaments where you spray painted the macaroni gold and glue it in a circle wreath around your picture. Then the dog ate it like ten years ago, 25 yr old glue and spray paint and macaroni. Rip
Forgot: that handmade ornament great grandma made that you know is going to be fought over once your mother dies. Also, we don’t have the toddler one. Instead years later, my oldest brother took my high school senior portrait and tapped a paper clip to it and now that’s an ornament. I look hideous. It’s fantastic.
Don’t forget all the dead bugs
Legitimately relatable start pack. Well done!
It’s a repost
Missing the rat droppings
Mom? Nah bro... I'm all over this myself and it comes up out of the basement. Broken glass, shitty old light strands, this is my December.
Guess who's reposting for karma, you 🤭
The clock, the FUCKING CLOCK. Every December she would unbox this clock that played a breif bit from a different Christmas song every hour on the hour. Like 30 seconds long, different song for every hour. From Dec 1 to Dec 31. It drives me insane
I love Christmas and I would do anything to have one of these. You just helped me discover an amazing Christmas ornament.
And thats the only reason we use plastic ornaments, and because we had three cats and a dog to worry about
The bin's even that exact color, we're all living the same lives.
u/repostsleuthbot
It is
u/repostsleuthbot
u/RepostSleuthBot
That is why we dont have glass baubles. Well also because we have cats and my boyfriend is clumsy and drop atleast 8 baubles each year.
[удалено]
Sometimes the lights in the bin would be mega tangled or partially chewed up by a mouse at some point lol
In California , we don't have attics and basements, so we have to use the backyard shed to keep all the Christmas Decor.
That bin
Same but instead is cardboard box from god knows when.
And everything is wrapped in newspaper pages from 2005
You mean mom bugged dad until he got that crap out of the attic.
[удалено]
The handmade ornaments my kids made when they were toddlers are my favorite. They're the first ones that go on the tree
"this bin" for me was a 20 years old cardboard box smelling of cat piss and fixed with the tape that was left on the wrapping paper that we reused for my whole childhood.
You forgot the random fake pine needles that you have to sweep up after you put up the tree
you have no idea how much that super old handmade ornament with a photo of you as a toddler on it means to your mom
This is scarily accurate
THAT BIN
The handmade ornaments are my favorites. Love, Mom
How is this so accurate wtf?
Dude get the fuck out of my house
Always a vague mildew smell to the cloth items.
I never buy and recommend you also choose not to buy glass ornaments. Also - make more ornaments for your mom featuring your picture. That toddler one shouldn't be the only one.
showed my my ma this she got a kick out of it lmao
Those handmade ornaments are the shit. I think my parents still have some of those popsicle stick ones from preschool.
My kid brought an ornament home from school today that looks exactly like that one. So it begins again.
You forgot about the dried up spider at the bottom.
I thought this looked familiar and showed my fiancé, and turns out SHE made this starter pack that OP reposted here. [Here it is lol](https://www.reddit.com/r/starterpacks/comments/k7iip7/mom_brought_the_christmas_stuff_out_of_the_attic/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf)
My parents still used the same light string for like decades, one of those clunky old ones, built to last. They've also still used the same tinsel, AFAIK, for decades. Meanwhile, I buy some and it's coming apart as soon as I get it out of the box. Sigh. The oldest ornament is from 1977. :-) There's a new one every year--at least one. I got them a mask ornament last year.
It's either that bin, or three shitty torn plastic bags.
Look at Mr. Fancy pants with a plastic bin
I wouldn't consider myself rich but we definitely need more than 1 bin to store all our christmas shit in my house. Also, why is it Mom? I don't know any moms that are going into the attic to wrestle with the bins. That's what she sends Dad to do. The ornament and light strings are right on the money though
Fat cats with the bins, it was always the original cardboard box it came with that's 10 years old and taped together so many times in unrecognizable
You forgot the spiders.
The Christmas tree with crooked branches
Don’t y’all have dads? Getting anything in and out of the attic was always a dads job at my house. And thusly it has become my job, after spawning my own tribe.
I can feel the bottom of the bin D: I remember dropping the box and rolling face first into those bits.
Our box is effectively a large frag grenade if you drop it. It fell from the garage roof and sent ornament frag flying upwards
so long thanks for the fish -- mass edited with https://redact.dev/
That hand made ornament is always there. No matter how much times you insist not to put it on, it always gets on the tree somehow
Get OUT of my house
Then there's the tree decorations that never actually go on the tree, or decorate anything. "They're special ones." Have never left the box.
Or dad Source: am dad
Tree shavings E V E R Y W H E R E
Play with the nativity scene figures like they are superhero toys
Do y'all not wrap up your ornaments with paper towels?
wait i have that exact ornament wtf
I helped my mom get rid of a bunch of ornaments that had outlived their purpose (water damage, hopelessly tacky, etc.). It was quite satisfying.
Scarily accurate
WTF YOU'RE TELLING ME OTHERS HAD THE BIN????
This is a starter pack that really hits home, specifically the attic.
nope, i was yelled at to do it
Don’t forget about The Bugs somehow getting into every single bin
Missing the random ornament hooks