Wednesday, May 30, 2007

gift giving tips

With W's birthday coming up, lots of thought has been going into the whole "giving of gifts" thing. I thought I'd share some tips for non parents on gift giving.

If you have a friend to whose child you feel obliged to give a gift to (or a niece, godchild, etc), and you don't really like the kid, and/or the parent, the following gifts are the way to go;

*any musical instrument, but drums and recorders are especially annoying and repetitive.
*things with more than 5 pieces, bonus points if the "thing" is no longer able to be built or used without a tiny, easily vacuumed up piece.
*books with themes which will require a lot of awkward follow up discussions. Suggestions include:
Where Willy Went
Jenny lives with Eric and Martin
I wish Daddy didn't drink so much
*any art and craft type items which are impossible to remove- personal favourites include the coloured blu tac type stuff, moon sand (easily the most irritating stuff ever), and non washable paints.


Now, on the other hand, if you like/love the kid and/or the parents, here are some of the most cool/interesting/fun gifts that W has received, or that we have given over the years;

^musical walking mat
^soccer and footballs, or that grip ball game...easy for kids to play with, and encourages everyone to get up and about
^books which are not about hard-to-explain stuff; some of my favourite books are anything by Lynley Dodd, Giles Andreae or Mem Fox, "Imagine", "Sleepy Bears", "The Very Hungry Caterpillar", "Hushabye Bear cub"...oh, I could go on all day....I could easily spend a fortune on kids books, and read to kids all day long.
^play doh mat
^toy cash register and play groceries
^mr potato head
^colouring books and stamps
^mega blocks musical juke box
^monogrammed towel

Hope that helps...a few people had asked me for advice in this area lately...Kids love anything and everything though, which is all that matters at the end of the day!

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