I rarely offer serious advice on this blog, but I’ve recently had two of my co-bloggers mention (separately) that they have the problem referred to in the title. Fact is, I’ve had this problem, too, and last Christmas, I figured out a good solution. Now I’m sharing it.
1) Check your gift-target’s Amazon shopping cart.
2) Look in the “saved for later” section.
THAT’S what they want but can’t bring themselves to buy for themselves.
Opportunity knocks.
Now, how you check their shopping cart, I leave up to you, but I’m pretty sure everyone sets their phone down and walks away at some point.
Or you can always just ask them to tell you what’s in it, because maybe they don’t know what they want off the top of their head – which is the other end of the gifting problem spectrum. Which is why I’ve been known to share the contents of my “saved for later” with others. It’s a great answer to a sometimes puzzling question.
All of my presents are re-gifted from the Dollar Stores either to me or from me so I’m good.
the rule I have with my parents and my wife is that we don’t get eachother anything. We’re all grown ups with incomes and if we really want something, we just go buy it. We’re not children and don’t need other people to buy us things that then magically appear without us having to put in the effort to earn them. Anything we would buy for someone else is likely going to be something we don’t really want or need and will just be clutter. Sometimes it’s thoughtful clutter, but still clutter.
Instead, we have this rule: don’t get me anything. spend time with me. We’re all very busy. The most valuable thing we can give each other is our time.
So this weekend, for our anniversary (we got married on July 3rd so we’d always have a day off the day after our anniversary) my wife got us a trip to a ranch in West Texas. There will be horseback riding, fishing, potentially pig hunting, and 4 days of just us, the dogs, and no work, phones, email, or any other distractions.
Best. Present. Ever.
the coolest thing about it is, you can give it over and over and it’s good every time you give it.
I live in west texas…there is no fishing here unless you rob a kids fish bowl.
i don’t thinknis THAT far west. its west for me.
A new car is usually a good choice.
You can never go wrong with Bourbon.