Call me un-romantic or cynical or even lucky if you are on my side, but my wife and I don't understand why we should feel pressure to give each other gifts on Valentines Day or any other "holiday" for that matter.

As I have stated many times in my Hubs, I have been with my beautiful wife since I was 14 years old. Of the 31 total years we have been together, 21 of them have been as a married couple but we lived together for about 5 years before that. I know this perfect, naturally beautiful, 44 year old lady better than anyone in the world and she knows me.

Very early in our relationship, we realized that it was not in our best financial interest to put out the extra money to give each other gifts for every holiday, especially the ones that someone makes up, but even for birthdays. As a married couple, we make pretty good money and have a very good life. We can buy almost anything we want within reason. So when holidays and birthdays come around, why should we spend the extra money on gifts we don't really need or particularly want? In the twenty one years we've been married, nobody had given us a good answer. Is it going to make her fall in love with me even more? No. Is it going to show her a caring or giving side of me she doesn't know? No. Why? Because if she really wants something, she will buy it herself. If we need something for the house, we buy it. So you see it just doesn't matter to either of us if we get presents for holidays and birthdays. Instead we buy and get presents and gifts all year. Things we truly need. 

Instead of giving each other gifts for holidays and birthdays, I have a couple of possible ideas you can do that will still make both of you feel good.

• The obvious and maybe not unique is just to have a night alone, no kids, and enjoy each others company. Valentines Day is supposed to be a day of romance. It doesn't have to be romantic but the time alone will do wonders for you both.
• Instead of giving gifts to each other, find a local charity or church you can give a small donation or gift to.

• If you must buy something to make yourself feel better, try to find something the whole family needs or has wanted for a long time. A new TV or computer perhaps or even gym memberships for the family or amusement park passes. These are the types of gifts you can use to keep your family bond strong. You know, a family that plays together...

Another thing my wife and I do that is kind of cute is instead of buying a greeting card for each other, we pick ones out that we would buy for each other and read them in the store. All the sentiment, no cost, no extra paper to go in the recycle bin at home. This technique also works great for cars and jewelry as well. She will tell me "That's the car I would buy you if we bought gifts for each other" or I would say to her "That ring would look so good on your finger if you accepted birthday gifts from me". Funny huh? Yeah well it works for us, what can I say?

Look guys, everyone wants to have nice things even me. So I have a lot of nice stuff. But when do you have enough stuff or too much stuff? Like I said earlier, I make a decent living and I can afford to buy nice stuff. I have two houses and a boat and a toy hauler with quads stuffed in it. I regret ever buying my second house and my toy hauler and quads because for the most part they all sit unused for most of the year. I love to go out and do it all but who's got the time? It's a big waste of my money. I would rather have that money to buy my daughter a book for her college class and save the rest for something I'll use.

So in conclusion, I'd like to quote the old cliche "it's better to give than to receive" and I agree with that. But give all year long. Not just on special occasions. Stop letting holidays dictate if you need to buy a gift for someone special. Buy gifts when you want to buy gifts, not because someone else tells you its that time of year again.

Jim B