Alternative Christmas Gifts, College Student Style

By Elizabeth Fulcher – News & Feature Editor

The holidays can be kind of tough when you’re a college student. With little money to spend, it can be hard to buy Christmas presents for all of your friends and family.

CSC (Campus Stewardship Council) came to our most recent forum to help give some alternative ideas for what to do during the holiday season instead of going out to buy expensive Christmas presents.

So what are some alternative Christmas gifts? During forum, the students split into four groups. One group took a more green route. They were provided with a cup to decorate, potting soil and parts of a plant.

Another group took a more financial route and discussed how they could donate $100 to an organization instead of buying gifts they might not particularly need. The third group gave the gift of time and helped donate care packages for those in need. The last group got took a creative route and made origami Christmas trees.

Christmas time can be rough for a lot of people financially, so it’s nice to have options.

Sadie Winter, Hesston College sophomore, has a few ideas of what she likes to do for Christmas gifts. She makes friendship bracelets, draws pictures and composes music. One of her favorite gifts is giving someone an original song written, played and recorded by herself.

“Music is something you can listen to whenever you want,” Winter said. “It’s the time put in, and the fact that I did it and made it makes it more special to me and my family.”

Another Hesston College sophomore, Luke Hertzler, likes to get creative as well during the holiday season. Luke shares that he wanted to get all of his friends something for Christmas, but he wanted it to be original and not something they already had. He finally settled on the idea of knitting everyone a dish cloth of their favorite color.

“I had developed the hobby of kitting when I was sick with leukemia and have loved it since,” Hertzler said. “Dish cloths are also an underrated essential at college for cleaning dirty dishes or surfaces.”

As he knitted each dish cloth, he would pray over it and think about the friend he was kitting for. The gift was creative, simple, meaningful and cheap.

Not all presents have to be expensive. Not all presents even have to go to a specific person either. Spending time on someone or something is just as meaningful as something bought at a store.

“It’s sort of sentimental,” Winter said. “Especially from a college kid, having them put the time into something means a lot.”