I actually like to do stockings. I fill them with gloves/mittens, coffee cups, kitchen gadgets and other useful things. I don’t buy toys or knickknacky items. One piece of candy. We are also gift heavy. I rightfully blame it on my mother. She loved loved Christmas. I am much more restrained than she was. We have so much fun at Christmas and everyone is grateful too!
I like stockings too. I usually get a couple of consumable things. Then a few small useful and not durable things. Charging cables, earbuds. Got both the kids gloves since those tend to get lost. Sometimes some small gift cards to coffee shops, froyo places, etc.
@mathmom, how about a nice pair of leather gloves with cashmere lining? (Maybe with a matching cashmere scarf?) If your son’s girlfriend lives in a cold climate, gloves always come in handy, and nice ones are always a treat. You can find well priced ones on Amazon. I bought a pair for my daughter last year that I liked so much, I got myself a pair a month later.
Ok, although I don’t like stockings, we do gift what I feel is a good amount to 28, 26 & 20 kids and 2 DIL. I’d spend even more if H didn’t object. I love getting high quality things they will use all year, like the professional grade air compressor for S2 with the side business.
I really like helping them at this age and figure they can use it so much more than when I croak, hopefully in my 80’s. Christmas and birthdays are our main gift-giving occasions.
The last few years we’ve done a family trip plus stockings. Kids are good with that.
I remember when I was in high school my mom told me she had been talking to Mrs. so and so who said she spent $1500 per kid at Christmas. This was early 80’s. My mother spent about $100 on each of us- lol! Our families had the same amount of kids and appeared to be of similar means. I have no idea what that mom was buying each year for $1500/kid. I used to secretly wish I were part of that family.
I do love to put together stockings. Everyone gets nice socks, lottery tix, a couple gift cards for eating out and a few other small gifts like make up, a yeti tumbler, etc. I do like reading about all of your ideas.
Just a warning on leather (and animal-based) products: make sure that whoever you’re buying them for isn’t anti-animal products. 
I gift pretty generously. My Mom loved Christmas and she was a great shopper. I know My H thinks I should spend less. I do a mix of practical and things they want that are expensive. I am a fan of buying them quality items versus a lot of small inexpensive items.
We have a fiancé added to the mix and another almost fiancé, I struggle with how much to spend on them. The male comes from a family that gifts little and I want to be generous but I also want him to be comfortable. The fiancé is at our home for many nights of Chanukah and is present when most of my children open their gifts. I want her to feel apart of the family.
I do stockings for my kids plus one fiancé. I am thinking I will phase this out as two of the kids do stockings with their mates.
Stockings- usually include a Nerd rope ( which I’ve forgot to buy), Haribo gummy candy, a mask from Sephora for the girls, cute tea strainers shaped like animals for the girls. Need something for my S. This year I also bought cord tacos.
One adult child just got tires, oil change and new windshield blades. That is an unusual gift this year but she needed them and H wanted to give them to her. A ceramic fountain from Oaxaca for her years. A painting I found when I went away with my friends. Underwear and socks (which she wants). I also made her a succulent wreath. A pair of Superfeet insoles and a book.
S is getting a drill and drill bits. A pair of expensive basketball shoes he requested and a book he wanted. I also picked up underwear and still want to find him 1 other item. I might just pay for his passport renewal and his car registration.
Youngest is the easy one. I bought her a pair of Dublin boots she asked for. An Instantpot and a cookbook. She also picked out a jacket when we were shopping. I also bought her underwear and socks. Forgot she will also get a pair of Super feet insoles. Book.
H has a birthday and will get a leatherman tool, super feet and a framed photo. He hates any one buying for him.
Boyfriend is getting a Easy Jet plane ticket to use this summer.
Fiancé- I still need to shop for.
I also will gift a few charitable contributions this season. Planned Parenthood, Anti Deflamation League,NPR and a couple of local charities I like.
She’s not anti-animal, she’s got some eczema and I don’t know exactly what exacerbates it. She’s also tiny - so while I think gloves are a great idea, I’d worry about the size. However, one could always make them easily returnable. She’s a grad student at Columbia so walking around campus can be frigid.
@mathmom, nice leather gloves are always a great gift. IMO. Maybe a nice knit or wool beret? Up where you live, it’s cold. My dh taught me that you stay warm better if you cover your head! And it’s true. LOL.
Does she wear boots? Boot toppers are cute. Starbucks gf, if she goes there.
I just had to give up on stockings. I think if I had girls, it would be easy but it’s just too much to do it for men-boys. They don’t eat junk so there goes that. If I put stuff in there like socks and chapstick etc. they just pull it out one by one going “eh”, “eh” so to heck with it. If they get socks, they’ll be wrapped as a present.
Everyone this year is getting a solar powered flashlight. I hate having non working flashlights!
I have a lovely pair of leather gloves with a cashmere lining that I cannot wear…at all…because they itch. I can’t wear cashmere…at all?
I don’t say this to sound rude or anything but it seems if you know someone enough to get them a gift you must know a bit about what the would like?
Scarves…wasted on me.
Leather gloves…wasted on me.
Knit hat of any sort…wasted on me.
Notice what they wear in pictures. Think about how they spend their time. Where have you seen them eat out?
What would you like for Christmas, abasket, in the $30-$50 range? Might be helpful for those who default to the scarves, gloves, hat route.
Well, the point is, to give a gift, you should know a person to a degree to know what would be an appropriate gift for them! So it doesn’t matter what I would like - unless you are buying for ME.
But to have no idea…and assume that someone can use another scarf, or gloves/hat/mittens or a specific book that you like - doesn’t make sense to me. If I’m giving someone a gift, I must know a little about them or have spent some time with them or heard some stories about them to know what they might like.
I may be over sensitive - I admit to not being a good gift receiver. It is so upsetting to me to get a gift I can’t/won’t use. And honestly it bothers me if someone gives me a gift that is just not me - it’s like they went shopping for someone else and never had “me” in mind when choosing the gift. But I think I’m a pretty good gift giver!
If you’ve seen the person you are gifting wearing leather gloves - then it’s probably an acceptable gift. But if they are wearing dollar store gloves or prefer mittens…then leather gloves might be awkward to receive.
I second abasket wholeheartedly.
Further, if someone gave me leather anything, I’d be offended. You really need to know me only on the most basic level to know that I would never want to have or receive anything made of leather, fur, etc.
I’d just say to always include a gift receipt and make sure it’s a store that they have around them.
Hmmm, I would likely use the opposite reasoning. If I see someone with nice leather gloves, I’d probably think they don’t need another pair. But if they were wearing dollar store gloves, I might think they would like a nice pair. So the gift of the leather gloves to the dollar-store-mittens wearer might be an indication that I was really paying attention to them personally, not the other way around.
Gifts can be so fraught!
But it’s also indicating that the dollar store gloves are sub par when in fact they may be super practical to the wearer.
true, gift buying can be tough. But try to tune into he receivers world, not your own.
Man, you guys are tough on gift givers!
I guess I look at gifts differently because I rarely get upset if the gift isn’t 100% spot on. (Nothing in life is; and it’s kind of a first-world “problem”)
I wouldn’t think that a pair of nice gloves were a criticism of subpar ones: I’d think the giver wanted me to have something special, something maybe I wouldn’t have the money to buy or maybe something I hadn’t thought about.
Gift giving can be tough. I try to remember that when I receive gifts, and not find it upsetting to get things that aren’t particuarly useful to me.
Which isn’t to say that there hasn’t been the occasional gift that was super-clueless. Actually, the one I can think of most was one from my dad who really should know me better than a SO’s parent or some such. And I wasn’t even upset by my dad’s odd gift, mostly just amused. As I was by a few gifts he gave my kids–hey, he’s a bad gifter.
Now, if you are a vegan and the giver has spent enough time with you to know that, then, yeah, leather products are pretty clueless and I can see being annoyed. But a scarf, when you don’t really wear them, from your boyfriend’s mom? Thank her and move on.