Thank you for all the support! First victory: I have given away (via Freecycle network) a big box of Christmas gift wrap, special hardware and scissors for making beautiful bow ties, Christmas gift bags including those for wine bottles (really splendid), special Christmas-colored scotch tape, HUGE bags for huge Christmas bags, basically everything that possibly exists to run a gift giving factory on Christmas. Plus, some more mundane stuff. I thought back to the time when I was buying Christmas stuff on sale; the stuff is really high quality - I did not lack taste, I lacked touch with reality. How did I see my life in front of me, in constant gift giving? Compare it with reality! I have neither friends nor money to buy gifts with!

I kept only two super small gift bags to give each of my two daughters a pair of shorts if they would be up to accepting gifts from me in 6 months. The rest I gave away. Now on to toiletries...