Introduction

Gingerbread houses, stories by the fireplace, a huge Christmas tree that is draped with lavish ornaments and popcorn tinsel: this is how most Hallmark Christmas movies are remembered and also the reality for most of us that are lucky to experience this dream of a Holiday. But what about those that aren't able to experience something like this?

While Christmas is one of the most loved holidays in the world, there is no doubt that the holiday carries burdens for other families. According to Gallup, it is estimated that Americans will be spending an average of $886 on Christmas gifts this year. And according to the Christmas Price Index, that contributes to the 5.7% growth of this year's CPI of over $40,000 compared to last year's about $39,000.

While it's easy to say that money doesn't make a holiday, it's hard to look over all the light-up decorations and presents without taking account its price tag. By measuring a 'picture perfect' christmas by its toll on a household's wallet, I collected and graphed the data of the average household incomes in 2017 (the most recent data I had) seperated by geographical regions: east, middle, and the west states of America.

I noticed that the mean household incomes differentiate substantially between west and middle with the west states having almost 10k more of a mean household income than the middle states. While the difference is not as extreme between the middle and west, I questioned whether there was a significant difference between christmases celebrated on the west/east vs the middle.

All families deserve to have their own perfect Christmas with whatever resources and means are available to them, and I hope to aid families with my simple app 'The Perfect Christmas' to make December 25th a special and magical moment for them.

https://capitalcounselor.com/christmas-spending-statistics/

App Layout

Echo 3D AR

• Augmented Reality DIY Gingerbread House: This would be a building simulator for a gingerbread house. Displayed is a possible finished product for your gingerbread house.

• Augmented Reality Snowflake Fight: This is an accuracy based snowflake shooting game. The target is the snowman that will be moving back and forth while your snowflake is also moving back and forth on the bar. The goal of the game is to defeat the snowman until the timer runs out (not pictured). To increase the difficulty, there will also be snow falling that will temporarily block your vision.

• Augmented Reality Fireplace: This will be a fireplace simulator that also plays fire crackling noise when opened.

Diary

• Advent Calendar Diary: This is a countdown/Diary app where the counter is on the top left hand corner starting at 1 and ending at 25. Once you attempt to write in another entry after the 25th date, it will reset for the new year.

Keywords are available at the bottom to display your most frequently used words in your diary entries.