Christmas party in June and decorations up in November: Meet the Christmas enthusiasts at Verkkokauppa.com!

Are you a Christmas person? The Verkkokauppa.com employees featured in this article definitely are! Who goes a bit overboard with Christmas gift shopping? And who watches dozens of Christmas movies every year? Keep reading if you want to find out more. Warning: you might get into the Christmas spirit yourself.

Susanna loves giving Christmas gifts: "I go completely overboard with gift buying"

Susanna is proudly Christmas-crazy. She's exactly the person who tries to sneak a bit of Christmas here and there at work with a twinkle in her eye. Susanna laughs as she reflects that her Christmas obsession was probably passed down through her mother's milk. Her mother has always loved Christmas too, which meant the holiday was a big part of Susanna's childhood home. To top it all off, Susanna was even born during the Christmas holidays.

For Susanna, Christmas is above all a children's celebration that "shouldn't be ruined by adult rush and stress." Christmas is when you gather with loved ones to spend important quality time together. According to her, it's not about competing over gifts either. Although gifts aren't the main point of Christmas for Susanna, she still loves delighting her loved ones with them – especially if the gift has meaning. "I go completely overboard with gift buying," Susanna reveals. "We're talking dozens of them."

Susanna finds gift shopping easier when you start early. She also suggests listening throughout the year to what your loved ones talk about and making mental notes of good gift ideas. According to her, Christmas stress is also eased by buying all your gifts under one roof. Verkkokauppa.com is a great option for this purpose in Susanna's opinion.

Christmas is also strongly reflected in Susanna's home decor, but not before the first Sunday of Advent – she firmly sticks to this rule. The Christmas tree is important to her, and it's decorated either on Christmas Eve Eve or on Christmas Eve itself. In previous years, Susanna has gotten a real tree, but this year she plans to invest in an artificial tree for environmental reasons. Previously, her Christmas decorating was child-focused, but now that the kids have grown up, the Christmas decor is more mature and the colors are more coordinated. Besides the tree, important decorations for Susanna include Christmas curtains and the elves sitting in the corner of the sofa.

Although Christmas decorations don't come out in Susanna's home until the first Sunday of Advent, she starts getting into the Christmas spirit and planning much earlier. Susanna usually starts feeling festive in November, but this year she started even earlier. She gets into the Christmas mood by browsing through stores' Christmas decorations and thinking about what decorations she'll get that year. "You have to buy new ones every year," she says. Besides browsing Christmas decorations, Susanna belongs to a social media group where people get into the Christmas spirit and share good tips. For Susanna, Christmas and planning for it brings joy above all. "I've never found Christmas stressful – I think you need to have these feel-good things," she sums up.

Elisa's two-month Christmas movie marathon

Elisa describes herself as a Christmas person who is "aesthetically restrained and otherwise anything but." "I'm that boring person who puts up white Christmas decorations, but then I go full throttle for two months," she clarifies. Elisa has a habit of starting to get into the Christmas mood as early as November. "Once Halloween is out of the way, you can start Christmas," she says.

Elisa's Christmas enthusiasm also started in her childhood home, where there was Christmas fussing in a good way. The family had a tradition of doing lots of Christmas activities together. "I remember we once had a mini-Christmas on June 24th," Elisa reveals. The family's relaxed vibe about Christmas has rubbed off on Elisa too, and she says she doesn't know how to stress about Christmas at all.

Elisa's Christmas passions are aesthetics, food, and movies. She also has her own tradition with her partner related to movies: starting in November, they watch a Christmas movie every single night. Basically, they end up watching all the Christmas movies on streaming services, from cheesy flicks to classics. They start and end this nearly two-month Christmas movie marathon with a good classic film – in between, they can watch all the cheesy movies.

Watching Christmas movies requires some snacks to go with it. Elisa's favorite treats for the Christmas movie marathon are Fazer chocolates. She also always buys the huge Anthon Berg chocolate box for Christmas. However, since Elisa doesn't feel like sweet chocolates every single day, she balances her movie treats with Pipers rosemary-thyme chips. According to her, they also go great with cheeses, crackers, and mulled wine. When the treats are sorted, watching Christmas movies and waiting for Christmas goes smoothly.

Juho thinks Christmas music needs to have a good vibe

Juho says he's a fan of Christmas food, drinks, and music. His Christmas enthusiasm originally started with time spent together with family and the massive piles of gifts he received as a child. "There's a certain magical feeling around it (Christmas)," he sums up.

Christmas music plays a big part in Juho's Christmas anticipation, and he listens to plenty of it. "I like Christmas music quite a lot," Juho says, clarifying that he prefers "more American-style Holly Jolly vibes." Mariah Carey's and Michael Bublé's Christmas hits are especially to Juho's liking, and he plays them pretty much around the clock in the lead-up to Christmas. On the other hand, he hardly listens to Finnish Christmas music at all: "I hate those Finnish Christmas songs where some sparrow always dies in the frost or an elf gets depressed."

Juho also has clear plans for when he'll start getting into the Christmas spirit: not until December 1st. Before that, he absolutely doesn't want to fuss about Christmas. When December 1st finally arrives, Juho starts feeling festive full force. That's when he naturally also starts playing Coca-Cola Santa-style Christmas music.

Tiia brings out Christmas decorations with a clear conscience already in November

Tiia is a huge Christmas enthusiast who gets chills just thinking about Christmas. She thinks nothing is as wonderful as Christmas approaching and the increasing fuss in stores. Tiia herself loves wandering around stores before Christmas enjoying the unique atmosphere. "Christmas is the best time of year for people, in my opinion," Tiia rejoices.

In Tiia's childhood home, all celebrations were celebrated to the fullest, but Christmas has become her absolute favorite. Tiia's family has had strict routines on Christmas Eve since childhood: the day starts with decorating the tree, Santa's hotline, and rice porridge, followed by a visit to the cemetery, sauna, and dinner. Finally, the evening is crowned with board games played together. Often Santa has managed to bring a new board game to play during the Christmas holidays. This year, Tiia hopes to get the Game of the Year winner Dinner in Paris board game from Santa.

Previously, Tiia started organizing Christmas only on Independence Day. Nowadays, however, she and her partner do Christmas card photo shoots, which means she can feel festive and decorate her home with a clear conscience already in November. Tiia likes to invest in Christmas decorations, and she admits to being a bit of a spender when it comes to Christmas decoration shopping.

Many people like to delight their loved ones with Christmas cards. Tiia has clear advice for those who want to take their own photos for Christmas cards: "Never force yourself or your kids to take photos, but try to capture the Christmas joy and feeling in them too." With kids, you can chat about Christmas gift wishes, for example, so that the subjects feel relaxed and comfortable, which also shows in the photos. You can position kids in front of a neat background baking gingerbread cookies, for instance. According to Tiia, the same applies to both Christmas card photos and photos taken on Christmas Eve: photos turn out best when you can convey the genuine Christmas feeling. That's when the photos are truly and genuinely lovely to look at afterwards. Forced stiff photos should be avoided.

Finally, Tiia wants to encourage people to enjoy the unique atmosphere of Christmas anticipation. "Even if you don't want to splurge and buy anything, I think everyone should still come walk around the store and feel that atmosphere," Tiia suggests. "Now is the best time to get out of the house instead of feeling anxious at home."