Skip to main content

Great small gifts

Image
By
Often Christmas is about more, more, more. More spending, more gifts, more stuff. It's tricky for the person who is happy with less stuff.

Three cheers for my family

My loved ones have done exceedingly well this year. All the gifts I received on Christmas day could fit in one envelope - not including those that fitted in my stomach ;) .

My free e-book 10 Great Gifts for People who Don't Want Stuff has a great range of gift ideas. Here are specific examples that are giving me joy rather than clutter.

Hand-made gifts

It's an unexpected treat to get something someone has put their time into making.

A friend (and her 8 and 6 year old daughters) made us this collection of soaps. We'll appreciate them as we use them up.


Held up to the light, they're amazingly colourful and bright. Even the bag they came in (courtesy of the kids) was fantastically cute.


Vouchers

Vouchers can be hit and miss. The tip is to go broad if you don't know the person well. Only go for a specific niche if you're dead sure that's what they want. Otherwise it's just a gift to the corporation as the voucher sits unused.

The hardware store voucher I received might normally have missed the mark but our new apartment could do with some energy-saving lights. The broadness of the voucher saved the day and made it a gift that is appreciated.

Experience

A book of 35 walks in my city. Yeah it's a physical present but relatively small and should provide a great number of experiences for my wife and I. Some of the places I haven't even heard of yet. It's like a little "lonely planet" guide for my own city.

Experiences are great because they create memories. Memories are great because they last a very long time - and often get better with age.

My wife knows this well and gave me a voucher for an activity we'll do together (more on that another time). My sister-in-law and brother-in-law gave us a voucher for sports tickets. They go to almost every Brisbane Lions home game. It's our choice which one we attend as their guests. (Update: Here's how it went.)

Food

My sister is very generous with presents. Sometimes overwhelmingly so. This year she combined generosity with her baking skills to cook up a storm. Great idea.

She fills those containers to the max. Whatever it doesn't have in fancy-schmancy presentation it makes up for in quantity and sweetness.


Also in food category, my wife made us a special Christmas brunch before we went out to the extended family Christmas event. No photo of that - I went straight for the cutlery before the camera ;)

Focusing on joy

The traditional (commercial) image of Christmas is a giant tree surrounded with large shiny presents wrapped with a bow. You see it at the shopping centre and on practically every Christmas movie.

These presents might not fit that expectation. But they bring more joy. Isn't that what counts?

PS. You may also want to read about my extended family's new tradition about gifts.
Read more about:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Are you missing out on your $5,200

By
According to research by Gumtree, the average Australian household has $5,200 of unwanted goods sitting around the home. Why not cash it in? I'm sure we'd all much prefer to have a few thousand dollars rather than all that clutter we no longer use. So far we've made over $1,630 We didn't have many valuable items - just a fridge and a lounge suite. Most of the cash came from lots of little items (around 170 of them) for 2, 5 or 10 dollars. It all adds up - to a surprisingly high amount.
Post a Comment
Read more

Inheriting Clutter

By
This book stood out on the library shelf. Massive clutter can create anxiety at any time, let alone when it has to be dealt with during one of the toughest points of life. Author Julie Hall deals with estates for a living. Her book covers the nitty-gritty of dealing with all that stuff. It also covers caring for parents while they are here and what to do to make life easier for them, your siblings and you. Parent Logic We may wonder why parents keep so much stuff. Julie explains that our parents (having grown up in a different time) have their reasons. Often they had to 'go without' as kids and so don't want to 'go without' again. Sometimes they think items will become valuable with age.  Also there's the thought "the more I leave the kids the more they will have" . This is obviously mathematically true - but whether that's a good thing is questionable. Ironically, this admirable quality of aversion to waste often ends up causing waste. Items get s...
Post a Comment
Read more

Monopoly, money and you

By
One of the most well-known board games can also be a great way to learn about money and investing - according to this book. Perhaps one way to teach kids (and maybe ourselves) about finance is to play a board game. In so many ways, the game parallels our own financial life - and we can practice financial decision-making without losing any real money. Is monopoly like life? Yes and no. We manage our cash, negotiate, make deals, make choices, go through tough times, make investments, pay tax and reap rewards. To do well we have to make investments. It's very hard to win just by collecting $200 each time you pass go. There are rules, and wise moves. The better we know them, the better we do. However, in real life, you can win without forcing others into bankruptcy. Principles that work in the game and life Diversify. You might have hotels on the two most expensive properties on the board, but if no-one lands on them, you still might lose. Investments have a price and a value. They are...
Post a Comment
Read more