I’m in NY right next to CT. I live in “horse country” and there’s a Santa thing where people dress up for the holiday and ride their horses around. I missed that. There are also local historical societies and community groups that do caroling and stuff.
Where I live, there’s a great party where the neighbors all come to the community building and it’s catered and Santa comes on a fire truck for the kids. Parents buy their children a gift and it gets stashed in a bag on the side, so when Santa comes in, the gifts are handed to him and each kid gets what they wanted (because it was chosen and bought by their parent). There’s a DJ and it’s BYOB. Casual dress.
I missed that party this year because my job had their huge holiday party at a fancy venue. Over 500 people. First two weekends in December were two parties I attended, each with an overnight hotel stay. There’s one next Saturday and there are many during the week but I don’t go to them all because to me, it’s just too much, especially if I don’t know the people there, they’re not going to miss it if i’m not present.
I live ten minutes from a huge, great mall in CT but I try to avoid it unless my daughter wants to go there with her friends. If I do need something at the mall, I’ll park right outside the store I want to go to, like Macy’s or Lord and Taylor, and run in and run out. I like Pier One and that’s nearby.
All the other places in the area are as commercial as anywhere else.
This year I haven’t bought much and I don’t need much. I think I’m going to give close family some nice wine or champagne and that’s it. They don’t need anything and I don’t need anything. If we all do ever need anything, we pretty much buy it for ourselves.