Nestle’s = global imperialist company with plans of world domination. I wince every time I find one of my favorite brands has been bought out by them. The list is staggering. They must have cash out the wazzoo.
@phendrick No kidding. Nestle ruined Cadbury chocolate. I remember selling World’s Finest bars when I was a kid raising money for Olympics of the Mind competition. If you want to get good chocolate look for a Dutch store. They know what they are doing.
@phendrick The UK still sells Cadbury chocolate made with the ‘old’ recipe. This includes Canada and British possessions worldwide. I have to make a border run and stock up.
@tweezak TJ Maxx carries ‘foreign foods’ (special shelf area), and Belgian, Dutch, Austrian, German and eastern European foodstuffs show up at random, especially around Christmas. Lots of chocolate. Occasionally Cornish buttermilk fudge, lavabread crackers and similar oddities.
@OldCatLady Last year Ross stores near me had Turkish Delight and what I think was UK Cadbury. I’m checking on them once a week now through Christmas for more. I hit four stores and bought them out on some of the items. The Turkish Delight went out to everyone on our gift list and we still get requests for more.
@duodec Truly great find, and now I have to go check the local Ross. I should add that Marshall’s and Home Goods are in the same group as TJ Maxx, but HG has more upscale foods.
@Luko26 Exactly! I have a friend who makes tons of money but has no family who upgrades my Fitbit every couple of years. Too expensive for me but he’s happy to get me a gift he knows I’ll love.
I like the gifts my mom gives me because they are handmade and really useful (quilt, wool stocking cap, delicious homemade goodies). I also like the gifts I get from my brother. They are either really funny one-off gag gifts or really useful tools usually very old and unusual. He’s always on the lookout for something and often finds something that he thinks I’ll like really early and holds onto it all year until my birthday or Christmas. I think I got some bag-o-crap stuff from him one year.
I used to like gifts until I started earning more money, grew a little more distant from family, and ran out of space to store things. Suddenly, I’m all, “can’t you all see that we’re victims of
I spend all my money at the home improvement store (will I get blocked if I say Lowes?) so I appreciate when I get cards to spend other people’s money instead.
My brother tries SO hard. He gives me these very generous gifts, for which I am grateful… and have no desire to own. So what to do? Most of the time the stuff gets piled into my office, or the garage, and gathers dust. On a couple rare occasions I stealthily exchanged a gift for something more useful. But for the most part the gifts just pile up. Expensive stuff too.
I’m a firm believer in gift cards for this very reason. It’s not that I don’t care enough to shop for just the right thing… no, it’s more like “who the hell am I to impose upon you responsibility for this gift you may well have zero desire to own?”
If you want, you could always compose a list so that I could shop online.
And where should we submit a list of stuff that we want, and which we hope you’d convince your brother to buy for you, which we’d then buy from you extremely cheap?
@ruouttaurmind
I see the rationale of gift cards, and as a windfall on your birthday it can be a nice gift, but I think once Christmas shopping has devolved to that, then I think a family should just take that final step and stop exchanging gifts.
If I give my brother and sister an Amazon $50 gift card; and my sister gives $50 Target gift cards to my brother and me; and my brother gives my sister and me a $50 Amazon gift card, what the hell have we accomplished?
@DrWorm my sister, brother and i went the route of no gifts to each other 20 yrs ago. We also did 2 other things:
we shop for our own kids for birthdays and Christmas but label gifts as from aunts and uncles (kid gets what they want and parents save on shipping since we live all over E Coast).
We give $ to charity in name of other siblings at Christmas.
@DrWorm the same could be said for any type of gift exchange. if i spend money to get you something, and you spend money to get me something…couldn’t we have both kept the money and bought ourselves exactly what we wanted instead?
which is not to say i disagree - i would just assume that most people who buy me gifts simply refrain, but they like to do it, so the best i can do is keep a list and hope they use it, and smile and say thank you either way.
both sides of my family decided to do “no gifts” many years ago. of course this was for the adults, and the grandkids would still receive gifts. i’m in my thirties, but still a grandkid. and then the adults would get each other gifts. “i know we said no gifts, but i just wanted to get you a little something…” or “mom really needs [thing], let’s all chip in and get it for her.” and now we’re at the point where we might as well say we’re doing gifts and actually get people something they’ve asked for. we’ve come full circle lol. never really stuck. would have been better to draw names.
the same could be said for any type of gift exchange. if i spend money to get you something, and you spend money to get me something…couldn’t we have both kept the money and bought ourselves exactly what we wanted instead?
Sorry, but I strongly refute the validity of this statement. There are a myriad of gifts where your assertion simply doesn’t hold true:
Gifts that you are tickled to receive, but are so frivolous that you would never break down and buy it yourself
Things that the recipient didn’t even realize he/she wanted (perhaps didn’t even realize that it existed)
Something that isn’t sold locally and would not be cost effective to ship. (It could be something as simple as a $3.00 bag of potato chips that are only sold within a 100-mile of the small general store where they are made)
That weird statue you found in Italy that looks just like cousin Dave
Anything your child made
Often times something that an adult made make even qualify (a quilt, a scarf, etc. from a close friend or relative)
Stealthily “borrowing” that photograph of your brother posing with his child-hood hero when he was 10, and getting it autographed by that hero
A batch of cookies from that family member that makes the best ones in the world.
Framed pictures of your kids to the grandparents
Retrieving a bunch of photographs from your mom’s attic that were water damaged and having them restored
A pair of tickets to take your father to the home opener for his favorite baseball team, with the commitment to accompany him.
Something that someone collects where uniqueness is key (e.g. I have a friend that collects bootleg toys – you know, “Adolescent Frog Samurais” or “Stupendousman” – and sometimes I just run across something that I know he would want. It might be July, but I buy it anyway and hold on to it).
Sometimes it can even be something it is “ok” for the recipient to throw away. Perhaps a gag gift, or something understood to be temporal in nature. At the pinnacle of our kids’ toy-receiving years, I gave my brother a “Guillow glider” as a nod to one of our childhood favorites. It didn’t last the day, but he had fun while it lasted, even though he was north of 30.
@f00l Its 6am and I’m trying to convince myself to get up early so I thought I’d see what Meh had for sale. My page opened to this thread and I thought about commenting but it’s too weighty for sleep brain…then I scroll down to this cartoon. I laughed so hard I woke my dogs. They were not happy or pleasant about it, don’t care. It was a good one. Thanks for a nice wake up.
I like useful gifts, but not socks! I’ll pick my own, thanks.
One of my favorite gifts more recently was when my mom bought me a whole set of towels. I had towels, they worked… They just weren’t the prettiest things anymore. I didn’t feel obligated to replace them. Since I had new towels, I could retire the old ones to dog towels or cleaning towels. Last Christmas she got me a new set of plates and bowls, my brother picked out a set of glasses that would match. Once again, I had these things, and they functioned. Now I have dishes I love. Granted she asked me which ones I wanted, lol. One year they both pitched in and bought me a tv, which was super.
I had to tell me ex to convince his family to stop buying me clothes. They never got the sizing right, and the styles were nothing I’d wear. I wear jeans/shorts and t-shirts. Very casual, all the time. Mostly black t-shirts. One year I got this dressy tank top with a bunch of gems around the v-neck. Another year, a red cardigan with a white blouse. Then finally they conceded and got me a gift card to Barnes and noble. Then the next year said I couldn’t have that, it’s not thoughtful enough. Meanwhile, the card was the best gift she’d ever gotten me.
@RiotDemon One of the best gifts my mom gave me was a gift card to JC Penny two years ago. I combined it with one of the many deep JCP discount offers and got a set of higher-end ceramic cookware. It was a triple-play: It’s a gift I use a few times a week, it makes cooking SO much easier, and cleanup is a breeze. It’s the gift that just keeps giving, and she wouldn’t have had a clue what to get me at JCP, so we both won.
BTW, I always contact the giver of gift cards and let them know what they got me, and how much I love whatever it was I used the card for.
My partner got me cake pans and silicone mats that I mentioned I wanted. He picked the brands, and asked questions since he didn’t use those things normally. He laughed and mentioned it was strange that he was buying me stuff for my birthday that could be used to make a birthday cake. I would message him occasionally to remind him that I was using the silicone mats and how much I loved and appreciated them.
My mom got me a kitchenaid mixer. It sits on my counter all the time. Love that gift.
@RiotDemon kitchen stuff is my jam, too. whenever my partner buys me something cooking-related from a wishlist, the joke is that the gift is really for him
@RiotDemon My friend and I give socks every year, its a part if our gift, a tradition. We try to find silly, comfortable socks that we can wear while working as we both work at home. That and I always try to include a silly, crazy, or holiday themed pen. Just little things that are included in our gift as reminders throughout the year maybe, of our long standing friendship and great times we’ve had without all the mushiness that goes with it…just put in your socks and smile Elke, I love ya.
missing answer: ‘something i actually asked for.’ i keep a list on amazon which is a mix of useful and useless items, as well as a range of prices (usually $5-40).
my parents and my partner always get me something great list or no list, because they actually know me and what i like. but i still have a few other insistent-gift-buyers in my life and i figure they might as well get me something i actually want and will use, right? although there seems to be this belief that simply buying someone something they asked for is…gauche? uncaring? un-thoughtful? so then they throw in something they picked out which is inevitably something i have to fake a smile over and will sit in a drawer until i no longer feel immense guilt over donating it. thanks?
@jerk_nugget saw some news article that they did a study of wedding gift buying. Findings:
A. the closer a person felt to the bride/groom the less likely they bought something from the registry
B. The bride/groom generally disliked the non-registry gifts. Some even got unhappy w those gift-givers.
So you/amazon have a good idea.
@mollama even though i don’t have any plans to get married, i’ve somehow ended up reading about this stuff and saw the same. i just don’t see weighing someone down with something they don’t want. again, my parents & my partner always buy me a few things off list and they are always amazing, but no one else knows me that well. that said, i would always, always accept the gift with a smile and say thank you. worse comes to worse, you donate it. rude brides can fuck right off.
i also notice a lot of uproar from guests that feel it’s rude for a bride and groom to ask for honeyfund or house hunting donations. i don’t get that either. these days most people have a life of their own before getting married, not to mention then living together before tying the knot. they probably already have at least two of every household item one would want to give as a wedding gift. why not give them the gift of a nice vacation they otherwise wouldn’t be able to take, or have a small part in helping them buy a home together? or just don’t go if you’re that salty over it.
at the end of the day, gift giving shouldn’t be about you, it should be about the recipient(s). sure, i love watching the few people i buy gifts for open them, but it’s because i got them something i know they wanted. i would never want someone to dread getting a gift from me.
@jerk_nugget my hubby was originally against gift cards and always wanted to get the perfect surprise gift, not from any list many times (like when the Wii came out he wanted one for all his sibling’s families even though none expressed interest). He’s more accepting of giving gift cards now, but he still wants to buy things he believes others would like but would never get themselves.
I stink at thoughtful gifts, the intention of the giftcard was huge for me. I feel like a heel and a slacker, but they get something theyd actually want.
My mother was the only person who gave me gifts that would make me cry. Something I collect or she just knew me SO well.
My sister did it last year with a pair of earrings that I had been sad to lose one of a pair I had, just like them.
The mr. had to be reminded to pay half.
I bought my own Christmas last year and announced it, dining chairs, bar stools, I like practical, useful.
My son will ask what I want or we pick it out, he likes to buy something I love, like pajamas!
I bought my own birthday present to myself, my black lab puppy, Allie, son found her for me.
I also got a rose bush in October, wt… ungrateful witch I am, LOL!
So there is nothing I want but maybe a fence for this dang puppy! She is too little to be with my 80lb male choc. lab.
Maybe a greenhouse.
I try and be extra thoughtful when I buy someone a gift, something they said they wanted or what I know they like. I love the look on their faces, surprise!
That is the best part of gifts, giving a heart’s desire!
@Calabama i try to do the same. i keep a little list in the notepad app on my phone - i jot things down throughout the year if i hear the person talk about something they want, or once lost, so i don’t forget come xmas or bday time. i can’t always hunt down whatever it is, but it’s really fun when i can
My sister and my grandfather have a thing where they sneak a tin of sardines (the same one every time) into some other gift, often disguised. It has grown increasingly more absurd as the years go by.
@thismyusername my aunt and uncle (but really my aunt is the one putting together the gift) always gives me some cash that’s somehow attached to the gift in a cute way. she always says “you still like green, right?”
last year we had been trying to track down the sink frog from my grandparents’ house. they were like second parents to me, and it just somehow worked out that each of the few things i had asked for when they cleaned out and sold the house after my grandfather died (gramma died years before him) had gone missing. i’m still kind of upset about it, but i’m not going to push my mom to go through the stuff we still have boxed up any sooner than she wants to. anyhow, my aunt caught wind of this and bought me my own sink frog, and stuffed his mouth with cash
Chocolate.
@OldCatLady N-e-s-t-l-e-s, Nestles makes the very best, choc-late.
@Barney @OldCatLady
Great… Now I want chocolate.
Edit: Found this for @mfladd
Chocolate squirrel.
@Barney
I prefer “World’s Finest Chocolate” – buy it from whomever’s kids have a fundraiser – loved it since I sold it in high school, many decades ago.
http://www.worldsfinestchocolate.com/about-us/our-history
Nestle’s = global imperialist company with plans of world domination. I wince every time I find one of my favorite brands has been bought out by them. The list is staggering. They must have cash out the wazzoo.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nestlé_brands
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nestlé#Controversy_and_criticisms
@phendrick No kidding. Nestle ruined Cadbury chocolate. I remember selling World’s Finest bars when I was a kid raising money for Olympics of the Mind competition. If you want to get good chocolate look for a Dutch store. They know what they are doing.
@phendrick The UK still sells Cadbury chocolate made with the ‘old’ recipe. This includes Canada and British possessions worldwide. I have to make a border run and stock up.
@tweezak TJ Maxx carries ‘foreign foods’ (special shelf area), and Belgian, Dutch, Austrian, German and eastern European foodstuffs show up at random, especially around Christmas. Lots of chocolate. Occasionally Cornish buttermilk fudge, lavabread crackers and similar oddities.
Edit time got me. Should be laverbread biscuits, the nonsweet kind.
@OldCatLady
Trader Joe’s has good stuff.
Or so I convince myself.
@OldCatLady Dutch chocolate is good. I loved living there and all the good chocolate they had.
@OldCatLady Last year Ross stores near me had Turkish Delight and what I think was UK Cadbury. I’m checking on them once a week now through Christmas for more. I hit four stores and bought them out on some of the items. The Turkish Delight went out to everyone on our gift list and we still get requests for more.
@duodec Truly great find, and now I have to go check the local Ross. I should add that Marshall’s and Home Goods are in the same group as TJ Maxx, but HG has more upscale foods.
@OldCatLady I hope they have them this year.
The kind that I specifically ask for, but it is expensive/unnecessary enough to convince myself to buy.
@Luko26 Exactly! I have a friend who makes tons of money but has no family who upgrades my Fitbit every couple of years. Too expensive for me but he’s happy to get me a gift he knows I’ll love.
Something I
canwill eat or drink, so I don’t end up with more clutter.Presence. If you really love me, pay a visit, hang out, spend a day with me. I have more than enough things.
I like the gifts my mom gives me because they are handmade and really useful (quilt, wool stocking cap, delicious homemade goodies). I also like the gifts I get from my brother. They are either really funny one-off gag gifts or really useful tools usually very old and unusual. He’s always on the lookout for something and often finds something that he thinks I’ll like really early and holds onto it all year until my birthday or Christmas. I think I got some bag-o-crap stuff from him one year.
I used to like gifts until I started earning more money, grew a little more distant from family, and ran out of space to store things. Suddenly, I’m all, “can’t you all see that we’re victims of
/giphy rampant consumerism
I spend all my money at the home improvement store (will I get blocked if I say Lowes?) so I appreciate when I get cards to spend other people’s money instead.
I truly would prefer not to receive gifts.
My brother tries SO hard. He gives me these very generous gifts, for which I am grateful… and have no desire to own. So what to do? Most of the time the stuff gets piled into my office, or the garage, and gathers dust. On a couple rare occasions I stealthily exchanged a gift for something more useful. But for the most part the gifts just pile up. Expensive stuff too.
I’m a firm believer in gift cards for this very reason. It’s not that I don’t care enough to shop for just the right thing… no, it’s more like “who the hell am I to impose upon you responsibility for this gift you may well have zero desire to own?”
Give a gift card, achieve 100% gift accuracy!
@ruouttaurmind
Great, now I want to go shopping in your garage.
@mflassy So. Much. Stuff.
@ruouttaurmind
That doesn’t bother me in the slightest.
@ruouttaurmind
If you want, you could always compose a list so that I could shop online.
And where should we submit a list of stuff that we want, and which we hope you’d convince your brother to buy for you, which we’d then buy from you extremely cheap?
@mflassy
If it was as easy as that I’d have a garage full of Bridgeport machine tools and a water-jet CNC machine!
@ruouttaurmind
The difference is, you probably say what you want.
I would use reverse psychology, or as we say in Texas, logic.
@ruouttaurmind
I see the rationale of gift cards, and as a windfall on your birthday it can be a nice gift, but I think once Christmas shopping has devolved to that, then I think a family should just take that final step and stop exchanging gifts.
If I give my brother and sister an Amazon $50 gift card; and my sister gives $50 Target gift cards to my brother and me; and my brother gives my sister and me a $50 Amazon gift card, what the hell have we accomplished?
@DrWorm
I support this assertion! As I originally posted:
But then, as I have admitted at least a few times previously in the forums, I am a blank, emotionless void.
@ruouttaurmind
Which is why I’ve been trying to offer you cash in exchange for physical objects which aren’t of any benefit to you.
Although something just occurred to me.
How much money is in the fund, and what physical objects could I get for it?
@mflassy There is about $44 in the fund, and you could cash that in on one red meh-fuk drawstring bag.
@ruouttaurmind
I’ll wait until I have enough to buy some gold.
@mflassy It’s kinda like those skee ball tickets in the arcade… you just need so darned many of them to get anything good.
/giphy skee ball
@mflassy
@ruouttaurmind
@f00l
Those of us in Texas who say it.
@f00l
@ruouttaurmind
@mflassy
“What do you mean, ‘us’, Kemosabe?”
@DrWorm my sister, brother and i went the route of no gifts to each other 20 yrs ago. We also did 2 other things:
we shop for our own kids for birthdays and Christmas but label gifts as from aunts and uncles (kid gets what they want and parents save on shipping since we live all over E Coast).
We give $ to charity in name of other siblings at Christmas.
@DrWorm the same could be said for any type of gift exchange. if i spend money to get you something, and you spend money to get me something…couldn’t we have both kept the money and bought ourselves exactly what we wanted instead?
which is not to say i disagree - i would just assume that most people who buy me gifts simply refrain, but they like to do it, so the best i can do is keep a list and hope they use it, and smile and say thank you either way.
both sides of my family decided to do “no gifts” many years ago. of course this was for the adults, and the grandkids would still receive gifts. i’m in my thirties, but still a grandkid. and then the adults would get each other gifts. “i know we said no gifts, but i just wanted to get you a little something…” or “mom really needs [thing], let’s all chip in and get it for her.” and now we’re at the point where we might as well say we’re doing gifts and actually get people something they’ve asked for. we’ve come full circle lol. never really stuck. would have been better to draw names.
@f00l
Fine. Maybe YOU don’t say it…
@jerk_nugget
Sorry, but I strongly refute the validity of this statement. There are a myriad of gifts where your assertion simply doesn’t hold true:
Hopefully you get the idea.
@mflassy
When I say “we”, referring to Texans; or when I say “us”, referring to Texans; I usually mean Texans, Kemosabe.
Other people are also acceptable to me, Kemosabe. They’re just not Texans.
Poor things.
/giphy Texas
@f00l
If you ever end up Fort Worth, I’ll might gladly go into more detail.
Of course though, if you’re in Fort Worth, then there are bigger issues to be concerned about.
@f00l
Just don’t come in a month which has one or more of the following letters in it:
• E
• A
• Y
@mflassy You must be Fort Worth’s special ambassador!
@mflassy
.
@f00l Its 6am and I’m trying to convince myself to get up early so I thought I’d see what Meh had for sale. My page opened to this thread and I thought about commenting but it’s too weighty for sleep brain…then I scroll down to this cartoon. I laughed so hard I woke my dogs. They were not happy or pleasant about it, don’t care. It was a good one. Thanks for a nice wake up.
@mehbee
I like useful gifts, but not socks! I’ll pick my own, thanks.
One of my favorite gifts more recently was when my mom bought me a whole set of towels. I had towels, they worked… They just weren’t the prettiest things anymore. I didn’t feel obligated to replace them. Since I had new towels, I could retire the old ones to dog towels or cleaning towels. Last Christmas she got me a new set of plates and bowls, my brother picked out a set of glasses that would match. Once again, I had these things, and they functioned. Now I have dishes I love. Granted she asked me which ones I wanted, lol. One year they both pitched in and bought me a tv, which was super.
I had to tell me ex to convince his family to stop buying me clothes. They never got the sizing right, and the styles were nothing I’d wear. I wear jeans/shorts and t-shirts. Very casual, all the time. Mostly black t-shirts. One year I got this dressy tank top with a bunch of gems around the v-neck. Another year, a red cardigan with a white blouse. Then finally they conceded and got me a gift card to Barnes and noble. Then the next year said I couldn’t have that, it’s not thoughtful enough. Meanwhile, the card was the best gift she’d ever gotten me.
@RiotDemon One of the best gifts my mom gave me was a gift card to JC Penny two years ago. I combined it with one of the many deep JCP discount offers and got a set of higher-end ceramic cookware. It was a triple-play: It’s a gift I use a few times a week, it makes cooking SO much easier, and cleanup is a breeze. It’s the gift that just keeps giving, and she wouldn’t have had a clue what to get me at JCP, so we both won.
BTW, I always contact the giver of gift cards and let them know what they got me, and how much I love whatever it was I used the card for.
Give a gift card, achieve 100% gift accuracy!
@ruouttaurmind kitchen stuff is my jam.
My partner got me cake pans and silicone mats that I mentioned I wanted. He picked the brands, and asked questions since he didn’t use those things normally. He laughed and mentioned it was strange that he was buying me stuff for my birthday that could be used to make a birthday cake. I would message him occasionally to remind him that I was using the silicone mats and how much I loved and appreciated them.
My mom got me a kitchenaid mixer. It sits on my counter all the time. Love that gift.
@RiotDemon kitchen stuff is my jam, too. whenever my partner buys me something cooking-related from a wishlist, the joke is that the gift is really for him
@RiotDemon My friend and I give socks every year, its a part if our gift, a tradition. We try to find silly, comfortable socks that we can wear while working as we both work at home. That and I always try to include a silly, crazy, or holiday themed pen. Just little things that are included in our gift as reminders throughout the year maybe, of our long standing friendship and great times we’ve had without all the mushiness that goes with it…just put in your socks and smile Elke, I love ya.
missing answer: ‘something i actually asked for.’ i keep a list on amazon which is a mix of useful and useless items, as well as a range of prices (usually $5-40).
my parents and my partner always get me something great list or no list, because they actually know me and what i like. but i still have a few other insistent-gift-buyers in my life and i figure they might as well get me something i actually want and will use, right? although there seems to be this belief that simply buying someone something they asked for is…gauche? uncaring? un-thoughtful? so then they throw in something they picked out which is inevitably something i have to fake a smile over and will sit in a drawer until i no longer feel immense guilt over donating it. thanks?
@jerk_nugget ugh, yes. Agree. It’s more thoughtful when you buy what I actually ask for and want. I’ll use it and appreciate it!
@RiotDemon @jerk_nugget My mum will ask what I want and then just get whatever is convenient for her. Never fails.
@jerk_nugget saw some news article that they did a study of wedding gift buying. Findings:
A. the closer a person felt to the bride/groom the less likely they bought something from the registry
B. The bride/groom generally disliked the non-registry gifts. Some even got unhappy w those gift-givers.
So you/amazon have a good idea.
@medz i hate that…i find it kind of insulting. like they looked at what you wanted and thought "ugh, why would anyone want this?
@mollama even though i don’t have any plans to get married, i’ve somehow ended up reading about this stuff and saw the same. i just don’t see weighing someone down with something they don’t want. again, my parents & my partner always buy me a few things off list and they are always amazing, but no one else knows me that well. that said, i would always, always accept the gift with a smile and say thank you. worse comes to worse, you donate it. rude brides can fuck right off.
i also notice a lot of uproar from guests that feel it’s rude for a bride and groom to ask for honeyfund or house hunting donations. i don’t get that either. these days most people have a life of their own before getting married, not to mention then living together before tying the knot. they probably already have at least two of every household item one would want to give as a wedding gift. why not give them the gift of a nice vacation they otherwise wouldn’t be able to take, or have a small part in helping them buy a home together? or just don’t go if you’re that salty over it.
at the end of the day, gift giving shouldn’t be about you, it should be about the recipient(s). sure, i love watching the few people i buy gifts for open them, but it’s because i got them something i know they wanted. i would never want someone to dread getting a gift from me.
@jerk_nugget my hubby was originally against gift cards and always wanted to get the perfect surprise gift, not from any list many times (like when the Wii came out he wanted one for all his sibling’s families even though none expressed interest). He’s more accepting of giving gift cards now, but he still wants to buy things he believes others would like but would never get themselves.
I stink at thoughtful gifts, the intention of the giftcard was huge for me. I feel like a heel and a slacker, but they get something theyd actually want.
I don’t need anything.
My mother was the only person who gave me gifts that would make me cry. Something I collect or she just knew me SO well.
My sister did it last year with a pair of earrings that I had been sad to lose one of a pair I had, just like them.
The mr. had to be reminded to pay half.
I bought my own Christmas last year and announced it, dining chairs, bar stools, I like practical, useful.
My son will ask what I want or we pick it out, he likes to buy something I love, like pajamas!
I bought my own birthday present to myself, my black lab puppy, Allie, son found her for me.
I also got a rose bush in October, wt… ungrateful witch I am, LOL!
So there is nothing I want but maybe a fence for this dang puppy! She is too little to be with my 80lb male choc. lab.
Maybe a greenhouse.
I try and be extra thoughtful when I buy someone a gift, something they said they wanted or what I know they like. I love the look on their faces, surprise!
That is the best part of gifts, giving a heart’s desire!
@Calabama i try to do the same. i keep a little list in the notepad app on my phone - i jot things down throughout the year if i hear the person talk about something they want, or once lost, so i don’t forget come xmas or bday time. i can’t always hunt down whatever it is, but it’s really fun when i can
My sister and my grandfather have a thing where they sneak a tin of sardines (the same one every time) into some other gift, often disguised. It has grown increasingly more absurd as the years go by.
@Durago Family tradition is such an awesome thing. I have known others with similar family silliness. Makes me wish my family wasn’t so scattered.
/giphy cash
(or some other form of useful currency)
@joelmw A restaurant near where I live now accepts payment in Bitcoin. I have never been more proud.
@joelmw always fits, always the right color… the perfect gift.
@Durago Updating that menu has got to be a pain.
Hamburger: 0.0014btc
Fries: 0.0006btc
Drink: 0.0005btc
@djslack I assume they use a conversion at the time of sale.
@Durago me too, I was just amusing myself.
@thismyusername my aunt and uncle (but really my aunt is the one putting together the gift) always gives me some cash that’s somehow attached to the gift in a cute way. she always says “you still like green, right?”
last year we had been trying to track down the sink frog from my grandparents’ house. they were like second parents to me, and it just somehow worked out that each of the few things i had asked for when they cleaned out and sold the house after my grandfather died (gramma died years before him) had gone missing. i’m still kind of upset about it, but i’m not going to push my mom to go through the stuff we still have boxed up any sooner than she wants to. anyhow, my aunt caught wind of this and bought me my own sink frog, and stuffed his mouth with cash
/image “billions and billions”
