<p>Candy cane pop rocks. And chocolate mice for my daughter’s stuffed owls :)</p>
<p>We are going up to D2’s house for Christmas this year. She has the Grandchildren. D3 will be there too. D2 wanted the stockings only for the children, but D2 had a hissy fit. So, I am doing the stockings for the adults, while D2 will do the stockings for the children – her 3 boys. </p>
<p>In our home stockings could only be opened after all of the gifts were opened. They always had socks and candy. Gift cards were added later. I love getting fun pens and note pads. This year, I found cute note pads with the Eiffel Tower on them. They usually get chap stick, too. One year when we lived in London, our niece came for Christmas. She was a very poor college student. That was the only year that I put cash in each stocking. I told my daughters that it was a one time thing, so our niece could have some extra spending money. (I had gifts of peanut butter and rice mixes for her under the tree. She was thrilled.)</p>
<p>My husband will probably get some fishing lures. I hope I get some good ones. He swears that they are all different, but they all look the same to me.</p>
<p>Bookiemom, that sounds lovely – giving experiences instead of things. </p>
<p>silverlady, oh, yes, there’s always a money envelope in the bottom of the stocking! Sometimes even with $2 bills in it. :)</p>
<p>Here, stockings are opened first; they can be opened before everyone is awake, even. Then breakfast, then presents. </p>
<p>Spawn used to open a present and then immediately play with it before going on to the next one. One year he got the Chipmunks Christmas CD; he had to listen to it, the entire thing, and one of my favorite Christmas memories is of him, his dad, and I dancing with joy and abandon to this CD. His dad and I had separated earlier that year; I was very glad we could still celebrate Christmas together.</p>
<p>opening presents before everyone is awake: When my 2010 daughter was three I had a new baby and a night job. My husband said she could open one gift and play with it before I woke up. She opened the one from my sister: it was a penny whistle.</p>
<p>When I was growing up my mother and father always put in our stockings (handmade felt socks with our names) fruit and nuts. No candy. I always felt like I was cheated. Now my kids get candy and they don’t even eat it…I do!</p>
<p>For my darling husband, I always get coffee, a fireplace lighter, nuts, after shave, socks and some sugar-free mints and the ever present fruit.</p>
<p>Our 25 and 21 yo kids get socks, chocolate santa, $25 gift cards, thank you notes (always!) toothbrush and floss, and a lottery ticket (Dad buys). </p>
<p>I do the same every stockings every year so maybe I’ll shake it up this year.</p>
<p>I just thought of a new gift for my son…a tire gauge! Easy to put in a Xmas sock and a practical gift! Yea!</p>
<p>Keep the ideas coming…love it!</p>
<p>The only consistent contents of all stockings in our house are nail clippers (it’s a very long-running joke–despite having who-knows-how-many of them, we can never find them, so we each get them every year) and razors–the multiblade disposible kind.</p>
<p>Gummy Army Guys. Not sure where they can be purchased. Son’s friend says they are two of the best things, gummies and army guys, put together!</p>
<p>momlove, googling “gummy soldiers” yielded this:</p>
<p>[Candy</a> Direct - Gummi Soldiers- 5lb Bulk](<a href=“http://www.candydirect.com/Albanese/AlbaneseProducts/GummiSoldiers]Candy”>http://www.candydirect.com/Albanese/AlbaneseProducts/GummiSoldiers)</p>
<p>I think I will save some of the Japanese treats I bought last week for DD’s stocking.</p>
<p>Mostly we put lots of “junk food” that we all enjoy but don’t buy often, including hubby’s favorite–dark chocolates. We also put some dried fruit and little odds & ends. We have lots of stockings–I think each of our kids has two or three and hubby & I have one apiece.
Their “good stuff” is mostly under the tree, wrapped.</p>
<p>
Husband just bought three of them for our girls’ stockings. Related question - is there some kind of cheap tool to keep in the car in case you need to break out a window in an emergency? I thought I read about it on a thread here recently, but I can’t find it now. I remember thinking what a good stocking stuffer it would be. I’ve wandered around Sears looking for it, but I’m pretty helpless in the hardware department. Does anyone know?</p>
<p>Funny you should ask. I just bought this yesterday for H and S1’s stockings:
<a href=“http://www.sears.com/shc/s/p_10153_12605_02823021000P?vName=Automotive&cName=AccessoriesforIn-storePick-up&sName=Emergency%20Kits%20&%20Travel%20Aids&psid=FROOGLE01&sid=IDx20070921x00003a[/url]”>http://www.sears.com/shc/s/p_10153_12605_02823021000P?vName=Automotive&cName=AccessoriesforIn-storePick-up&sName=Emergency%20Kits%20&%20Travel%20Aids&psid=FROOGLE01&sid=IDx20070921x00003a</a></p>
<p>Our stockings are filled every year with random small things. I always buy too much, and end up putting the larger items under the tree as extra gifts.</p>
<p>Okay, I’m an idiot - that’s what dh bought! I thought it was just a tire pressure gauge. Um … never mind (but thanks, binx!).</p>
<p>Fun thread! Growing up, there was always an orange in the toe of our stockings. I continue that tradition, even though neither D or S seem to eat them. One year (after they stopped believing in Santa) I substituted a chocolate orange, which they ate but said it wasn’t “right,” it was supposed to be a real one. More recently I use clementines since I eat a lot of them.</p>
<p>Up until last year S (now 18) always got a small Lego &/or Bionicle kit. A year ago I found the one from the previous Christmas unopened. Hm-m-m, maybe I’ll put it back in his stocking this year! Now that D & S are older, I do toiletries, a Starbucks card for D (who can use it on campus), some chocolate, and whatever clever things I can find. One year I had spectacular success at Restoration Hardware. Love the idea of lottery tickets, especially for S. He was working working away from home this past summer when he turned 18, and the first thing he did was buy a lottery ticket, just because he could. They always get Christmas crackers, too.</p>
<p>My stocking gets filled by H, except now that D is older, he sends her out to shop. I usually give her a list so I at least end up with stuff I can use.</p>
<p>Re: tire guage. After her sophomore year D took a summer course at her school. We let her take a car, but after she left I realized there was no tire guage in the glove compartment. So, I sent her one with instructions to check the pressure when the tires were cold. When she got back home after 6 weeks, I asked her if she ever checked the pressure. She said, “No – it never got cold out. I was in North Carolina you know.” Sigh.</p>
<p>Frazzled-It was called “Life Hammer” and would break a car window and also cut a seatbelt. I ordered them for all our family after seeing them on that thread a few weeks ago. If you google the name it pops right up. I got mine from Amazon.</p>
<p>It’s kind of pricey, but I got an Amphipod handheld water bottle holder with a key/cell phone pocket for my son’s stocking. He has just started running, doesn’t like fanny packs, and doesn’t know what to do with the stuff he needs to carry.</p>
<p>I love stockings and I’m just getting started with this year’s shopping. I usually get pens/pencils, small notebooks, definitely some kind of socks (good for providing bulk in the stocking), a magazine rolled up, and a container of Altoid chocolate mints. Sometimes a CD or some inexpensive jewelry.</p>
<p>Love the tire guage idea!
Here are a few items I’ve bought so far for my Ss stockings:</p>
<p>Window scraper
New Ipod ear buds
Lottery scratch cards
Rubix Cube
Pens & Post-its
Slim Jims (yuck!)
Magazines (I roll these)
Toothbrushes</p>
<p>When we’d got tall enough to add to each other’s stockings, my mother (who’d made those stockings) decided she was done with missing the fun, and dug out stockings that my grandmother had made for her and our dad. She also made stockings for all the spouses, grand-kids, and exchange students over the years. Sister #3 nabbed the patterns and fabric when we divied up the estate and is now fabricating stockings for the grand-kid’s spouses and next generation exchange students. </p>
<p>Everyone who is tall enough to reach the stockings, or can stand on a chair to reach the stockings, or is still light enough to be lifted up to reach the stockings gets to take part in filling the stockings. This has to be done in shifts so that we don’t see what the other people are stuffing in there. But since the stockings are not huge, occasionally late-comers have been known to re-arrange the items so that they fit better - usually with a comment along the line of “Gee, where did you find this?” or “This has gotta be from X”.</p>
<p>Everyone gets to be Santa.</p>
<p>When I was little, my sisters (I’m the baby) use to get me up, and we’d sneak downstairs to our stockings hung over the fireplace, pull out the wrapped box, c a r e f u l l y open the package, look at the gift, then carefully rewrap the gift. We got a charm for our charm bracelets every year as our stocking present. What a really happy memory. I still have the charm bracelet!</p>
<p>We don’t have a fireplace, but I do have a wall with a wrought iron rod on it which holds a seasonal quilt during most of the year. For Christmas, I take down the fall quilt and hang our wreath and stockings from the rod. My kids get their annual Christmas ornament in their stockings.</p>
<p>Thanks for all the great ideas.</p>
<p>Here are 3 that I haven’t seen listed. </p>
<p>1-travel sized bottle of Advil for the backpack or purse
2-spray bottle of eye glass cleaner
3-the box of lifesavers that opens like a book (when I was little, I loved getting these)</p>