What is the best way to tell family we don't want to exchange gifts, but to use money to donate to charity in their names for the holidays instead? We have had people respond negatively to this in the past if it wasn't accompanied by a "gift".
You can take two approaches I think, give the people who whined last year a regular gift or give to the charity and ignore the whining. It depends on how much it matters to you that these particular people aren't happy with their gift. Ultimately you're under no obligation to give anyone anything. Personally, I like to give gifts I think the * recipient* would want, not what I want them to want. We only make charitable donations on behalf of friends and family we think can appreciate that. Everyone else gets gifts (often handmade). You could give baked goods as an accompanying gift to the donations.
