e-mail
I realize that Christmas day is getting way too close for the amount of shopping I have completed this year. I am also having difficulty wanting to choose individual gifts for some of my children whom I have had a difficult time with this year. One of my readers mentioned family gifts and Cindy Bodie did a blog on family gifts recently as well. Because over the years, we have parented nearly 100 children, we practically own every toy, book, and gadget known to modern children already. Not to mention that if they really need something, like a pair of boots, I certainly won’t wait until Christmas to buy them. This makes it difficult to purchase original items that are practical and that they will enjoy and use. Therefore, I am going to buy into the family gift idea and just give each child one or two individual gifts.
One big mistake I made this year was buying the Wii in July and giving it to them then. If you have purchased one, then you already know that the console with four controllers, four nunchuks, and a game adds up to about 600. However, I can still purchase additional games for the system as family gifts. One of the children, I believe it was the one we call “Not Me,” broke the VCR. While we are accumulating DVDs, we still have many old favorites on VHS so I bought a new combo player as a family gift. I found a teeter-totter for a reasonable price that holds up to 300 pounds. That means that every person in our home with the exception of my 18-year-old son can teeter together on it, making it a great family gift as well.
Well, at least that makes me feel better about the approaching holiday. I was beginning to get quite depressed over the whole thing. Thank you so much for the great idea. I believe that this will make everyone happy.
Photo Credit Julia Fuller 2006
Now you’ve got me thinking about this solution. Now what can we bring home that is not too expensive and does not causes brain cell loss? Hmmm . . .
Rachel
Great idea Julia! I’ve already done my shopping for this year, but since we have been parenting for almost 22 years including fostering and running a daycare, we also have every toy known to man here as well (I’ve gotten rid of TONS, but it keeps accumulating still!!). I’m going to announce after Christmas that next year we will do family gifts and for the individual gifts I will ask them for ideas of one thing they need and one thing they want. I reserve the right to throw some fun things in as I see fit, but that as far as expectations go, that will be the plan. When my oldest were babies we couldn’t afford to buy things all the time, so Christmas and birthdays were big, but we are buying stuff as needed/wanted/earned all year long now and we don’t need more “stuff” on Dec. 25th just because. Last year for some of the kids b-days (3 are in April) we bought a teeter totter from Sams Club and this fall we saw this octagonal climber that matched it so we bought that recently as a family gift for 4-5 of the kids for Christmas. It holds up to 2000 lbs. and it’s low enough that I won’t worry about my youngest falling (far). It was just under $100 so a very good value for the amount of kids that will use it. I will definitely consider the Wii for next year, I have a few kids who would love Guitar Hero as well. Great ideas!!!