Gift Guide For Good Kids (Or Even Merely Tolerable)
Herewith, gift ideas for the kids. I’ve tried not to duplicate the ideas I put in last year’s gift guide for boys, so if you need more thoughts, click here and see what I recommended last year.
If you’ve missed the other installments, the gift guide for teachers, babies and toddlers is here. Part Deux, including suggestions for people who are hard to buy for, is here.
READING
All three of my boys are on the fifth Harry Potter book at the moment. Last night we’d stuck Porter in the bed, but he popped out and came in our room to inform us that “all the house elves except Dobby are drinking lots of butter-beer, and it’s very strong for house elves. I’m worried about what will happen.”
For those of you who haven’t been hooked by these books yet, they are a gift to this generation of up-and-coming readers, and are responsible for my younger boys making huge leaps in their reading ability this year. I haven’t been able to snap a picture of the boys running in the driveway riding brooms and chasing a tennis ball and a basketball simultaneously in an Alabama version of Quidditch, but I assure you it happens.
Drew practices his broom-riding technique inside
I’d do anything to encourage an eight or nine-year old to read the Harry Potter books. They get longer as the series progresses. Consequently, we’ve purchased the paperbacks so the boys can lug them to school without chiropractic assistance.
I received a magazine in the mail that features expensive Harry Potter paraphernalia, including a replica of the sorcerer’s stone ($95) and a pewter Gryffindor mug ($55) but the Hogwarts bookmarks aren’t quite as pricey. ($20)
All of the books I recommended in last year’s Boy Toy gift guide are still popular, especially Little Lit. Other hits this year for the twins included Roald Dahl’s books (James and the Giant Peach and The BFG were clear favorites), Andrew Clements’s books (especially The Landry News and Lunch Money), Diary of a Wimpy Kid(the graphic format and honesty captivated them), and a copy of The Dangerous Book for Boys
together with some of the supplies called for in the book, such as a compass, rope, a knife, and so forth. Aunt Su gets credit for this genius idea.
(Although, I should point out that they didn’t need a book to learn how to be dangerous. Finn told me that earlier this year when I raced to the store for forgotten dinner ingredients, he and his brothers collected twigs, sticks and leaves, mounded them in the
driveway, set them on fire and enjoyed the spectacle. When I called to say I was on my way home, they extinguished the fire, swept all traces from the driveway, changed their clothes and resumed their homework as I drove into the garage.)
There’s another series of books including Wizardology and Pirateology that Drew and Porter both adore. It’s a lot like a scrapbook style story, as if you discovered a sailor’s journal of his quest to find a pirate, with maps and drawings.
Often I’ll see large coffee table books on the bargain shelves at the bookstore. I’ve picked up one about the Titanic and one about the Civil War, and the boys have been fascinated by the pictures. That’s been another good way to sneak in some learning. Tuesday Morning also had some of these.
Porter has been stealing my printer paper and making all sorts of paper airplanes. If I didn’t already have plenty of ideas for him, I’d buy him his own sheaf of paper and The Klutz Book of Paper Airplanes. Or if I felt guilty about destroying trees, I’d get the Encylopedia of Immaturity (Klutz) which contains tons of funny activities, like instructions for taking a picture where it looks like you’re holding your tiny friends on your thumbs.
For the older crowd, I’m high on three new books. Alabama Moon is by Watt Key, a Mobile native I got to know last winter. He’s a hoot, and has spent so much time in the wilderness that he’s eaten armadillo just to survive, and then discovered that chewing pine bark cured the horrific halitosis caused by the armadillo. Let me hasten to add that he’s gotten rave reviews for his book, and you don’t have to love armadillo or be from the South to enjoy it.
Watt Key’s Idea of Dinner
What Watt Key Uses Instead of Colgate
The Chicken Dance was being promoted at BEA last spring, and I got to meet the charming author, Jacques Couvillon, who kindly inscribed a copy for Finn: “You can fly!” The author photo shows him feeding chickens while wearing a tux, and if that isn’t a kick-ass picture, I don’t know what is. I’m going to start this book as soon as I finish the damn John Rosemond book over in the right sidebar, the one about fostering responsible decision making in your teen. Or hell, that book doesn’t seem to be working, so maybe I’ll start The Chicken Dance tonight. I could use a break from the parenting grind.
How about the way I’ve organized everything so neatly into Books and Not Books?
One of the best suggestions I received this year would be good for anyone, but especially younger drivers: gas gift cards. Here is a site where you can order Shell gift cards. I just Googled it; I’m sure you can do the same for your nearby station.
Kids with iPods (or hell– anyone with an iPod) can always use an iTunes gift card.
Art supplies are always a good bet- as Drew got older we got him special sketching pencil and sketch paper. In last year’s gift guide I described other popular art supplies. But wait! What if you’ve been there, done that? Then it’s time to move on to those office supplies the kids are always snatching from you - Post-It notes, large paper clips, different kinds of tape, staplers, index cards, fancy pens and pencils, pads of paper and notebooks, and so forth. You know who would love this? Zoot. She goes ballistic over office supplies.
Speaking of office and school supplies, my reliable friend Margaret, who should have just written this damn guide herself - THAT’S how many great ideas she had– has alerted me that there’s a segment of the elementary school population that’s wild about Pencil Petz erasers. The kids stack them on pencils or make bracelets out of them. There’s no denying that collecting erasers is much more edifying than fighting over Soulja Boy.
If you’re purchasing for hangman or tic-tac-toe lovers, Horchow makes a set of three pads, one preprinted for each game and one for drawing. You can personalize them, too.
Kids also go nuts over Transformers. Frankly, I find them creepy. What mother would buy something that is described like this:
BONECRUSHER hates everything, and what BONECRUSHER hates, he destroys. He hates this planet, and all its inhabitants. He hates the AUTOBOTS for getting in his way. He even hates MEGATRON and the other DECEPTICONS; the only reason he stays with them is because MEGATRON scares him. BONECRUSHER lives for the day when he’s the only one left standing atop a pile of smoking rubble and shattered robots.
Now that I look more closely, I see that it transforms from a Camaro into a scary yellow robot, and that’s pretty cool. If there’s a boy on your list, you cannot go wrong with a Transformer.
Porter received a METAL DETECTOR one year and it’s been extremely popular. There are detectors made for kids, but this one is a little cheaper. You can see other choices on that page. Alabama is in a severe drought, and the lake is lower than it’s been in years. We were there a couple of weekends ago and the boys had a fabulous time finding buried treasure such as broken deck chairs, a varied assortment of liquor bottles, a boathouse door, an original pop-top Tab can, and a pair of parachute pants. We didn’t find tons of money or jewelry with the metal detector, but if it had been there, we would have.
Here’s a picture of a dried-up lake that yielded many treasures.
There’s a special place in my heart for the red parachute pants we found. U Can’t Touch These!
Porter saw this set of huge maps U.S./World 2 for 1 Map at a bookstore and purchased it with his own money. As soon as we got home he hung one over his bed and one on the opposite wall. Then he stuck pushpins in the places he’d been. The world map shows the flags of different countries at the bottom, which is riveting for a nine-year-old. Both boys used the map of America when they were getting ready for their geography test. This was the best money Porter’s ever spent.
Readers have also suggested Settlers of Catan, which I’ve never heard of but which sounded intriguing on the web. Defective Yeti speaks highly of it and appears knowledgeable about games, so this is on our list.
The boys are still captivated by Legos and I don’t think I mentioned Playmobil last year. They spend hours with these figures, building stuff. You can spend a little and get the Pirate Crew or spend more and get the Playmobil Pirate Ship, for example. The possibilities are endless here.
Porter can bounce a basketball while jumping on his Flybar Pogo Stick and I’m getting him some balls so he can practice juggling while jumping. Porter has his eye on the Flybar 800 Pogo Stick which promises to hurl the pogo-er over four feet into the air. Too bad for him, as I have no intention of letting a $200 “toy” that propels your child into space onto my property, but if you purchase it, let me know how it turns out. We achieve plenty of air and the resulting bruises without added pistons.
Instead, we’re going the Ripstik Caster Board route, which is probably no safer but prevents you from watching your child purposely soar into the air. The Ripstik is a two-wheeled skateboard that lets the rider pretend he is snowboarding… on asphalt. Don’t forget the helmet and pads.
You can use Roller Blades or Inline Skates to race, or you can play roller basketball in them. Porter can even rollerblade into a Port-O-Potty, do his business, and rollerblade out without falling. What are we going to do with all his non-marketable skillz?
You know my stance, or should, so no talk about Game Boys and Wii here.
Last year Porter got a simple HP camera for Christmas. You may remember seeing his highly successful retrospective on Portugal. He also discovered that the camera takes movies, and that’s how we created the irresistible Yo Mama! Finn enjoyed filming the action, while Drew proved particularly adept at editing with the Movie Maker program that came with our computer.
My point is that while there are digital cameras made especially for kids, like the Fisher Price Kid-Tough Digital Camera for Boys (they make a girls’ version also), you can spend a bit more and get a real camera. The plastic ones would be good for the younger crowd, but an eight-year-old would enjoy having the features of Porter’s camera. This HP Photosmart M447 5MP Digital Camera is still just under $100 if you purchase it with a 1G memory card. Here’s a Kodak EasyShare C533 5MP Digital Camera. I can’t believe the megapixels on these things. Porter’s Portugal pictures were outstanding, and his camera has 5 MP.
We have NO videos of our children as babies, or toddlers, or at all. That’s because early on, I told Bill that I could be in charge of raising children and taking still photos, or raising kids and shooting video, but not both. He said he’d handle the videos, but remember those tiny cassettes? The big black bag you had to lug around? The way the battery was never charged? It was a big pain in the ass.
The digital camcorders of today have changed all that, and we’re outsourcing our video requirements to Drew, who always has two free hands.
I saw the Aiptek DV5900 5MP Pocket Digital Camcorderat Target the other day. Easy as pie, and tiny!
Yeesh. That’s a lot of ideas for one column, and I have to go make some Brussels Sprouts with Bacon and Peanut Butter Brownies. Hope this helps you finish your holiday list for the small fry.
It was time to give Drew the sex talk. If you’ve been reading, you’ll remember that he’s been showing signs of readiness. He snickers whenever he hears the word “sex,” which is often in today’s society. He giggled when he saw that his hospital wristband contained the words “age/sex” as part of its identifying information.
We drained the pond at the Auburn house last week, and it’s been dredged and treated with chemicals to kill the existing fish so it can be restocked. All three boys were wading through gloppy red mud, filling dead carp with BB holes, when Drew began taunting Finn.
“Porter and I came out of Mommy’s tummy, but you came out of her lady parts!” he yelled, then laughed so hard a snot bubble came out his nose, according to Finn, who reported the incident to me immediately after they returned to the house.
For Finn, the final straw came that night when the boys were upstairs getting ready for bed and Drew asked Finn, “Have you ever had sex?” with a mischievous gleam in his eye.
“Sex means if you’re a girl or a boy,” Porter said with a mouthful of toothpaste fuzz, and for once Finn was glad to have Porter’s input.
“Seriously, Mom, I think you’ve got to tell him something,” Finn told me. “What if he starts asking my friends if they’re having sex?”
So the next morning, I called Drew in from outside where he’d been assiduously destroying cinder blocks with a hammer just because they were there.
“Hey honey, do you know what ’sex’ means?” I asked.
“Not really.”
“Well, it means that a mom and a dad get naked in bed and kiss and make googly eyes to make a baby,” I said, deciding that premarital and recreational sex were off the table for the third-grade crowd. So was sex on the pool table, the living room floor or in the handicapped bathroom.
Drew’s pale face grew red.
“Do you know how moms and dads make babies?” I asked.
“No.”
“Do you want to know?”
“Not really.”
Damn. I had polished up my speech and practiced my coital finger movements, but I was being asked not to perform. I was a bit disappointed.
“Okay, but when you decide you want to know, don’t ask Finn or friends at school. It’s important that you ask me or Daddy and we’ll tell you exactly how babies are made, because we’re really good at it.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“And don’t go around asking Finn and other people if they’ve had sex, because what you’re asking them is ‘Have you gotten married and gotten naked in bed with your wife to make a baby?’”
“I thought it was just a joke,” Drew said.
“Sex is no joke, but it’s easy to get mixed-up about. Is there anything else you want to ask me about?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Then head back outside.”
He did, and I exhaled. I hadn’t noticed until them how nervous I was. I’m guessing it won’t be the last time.
Damn, the duo is at it again! Remember a couple of years ago when elves were all the rage and I refused to go along, reasoning that Santa is enough?
Last Tuesday I walked by the fireplace and noticed this:
The boys didn’t have any Nerds this time, but it was obvious they were trying to lure an elf. Drew was extremely polite about it:
I’m still not going to succumb. I can’t deal with Christmas gifts, Finn’s birthday, the Christmas card, my regular schedule and remember to move a fuzzy green elf around the house. I told Bill that if he felt the boys would be emotionally scarred by the absence of an elf from their childhood memories, he could come home from work and move the damn thing from the washer to the refrigerator and give his boys a cheap thrill. He declined.
The notes and crackers have sat untouched for almost a week now, but the boys are still hoping an elf will appear.
They may not learn the truth about Santa this Christmas, but they’ll discover that he has limits.
Some people are hard to buy for. They have everything. They engage in esoteric hobbies that are impossible to acknowledge with a present. These are people who never express appreciation but that you might feel obligated to purchase gifts for because of blood or marriage. Many of us have ancient relatives with closets full of bedroom slippers and scented soaps.
I hope these ideas will help you with the hard to buy for people on your list. Remember, though, that you can always make a donation to their favorite charity in their honor if that will bring them pleasure.
Do your parents already have a set of salt and pepper shakers crafted to look like themselves? If not, they don’t truly have everything. For the single recipient, the wine stopper would be a hilarious choice.
This next gift won’t win you any points for bringing sexy back, but it will be put to good use. Have you discovered the wonder of Tervis tumblers? They don’t sweat, they don’t crack in the dishwasher, and they keep cold drinks chilly. We only have four and we fight over them. I linked to the clear ones, but if you click around you’ll see that they come in
several shapes and tons of designs– adorned with sports teams, or Adirondack chairs, and in different colors. I’ve seen the sports-themed ones at Bed Bath & Beyond, also. Lifetime guarantee!
Perhaps a prepaid membership to Netflix for a certain amount of time would thrill someone? Alternatively, Mystery Mommy says buy someone the DVD’s of shows or movies you’ve enjoyed. We don’t have a TV in our bedroom (marital compromise) so one year I gave Bill a portable DVD player and Seinfeld DVDs to watch at night. Others have
suggested Gilmore Girls, Six Feet Under, Planet Earth, and 24. Y’all please put other movie/show ideas in the comments with thoughts on other gift ideas, as television is one of my weak points.
Those books have a story and recipes, but a wonderful cookbook is nice, too. Some of you may hear “Junior League cookbook” and immediately think of cream of mushroom soup-flooded casseroles, but if so, you’re behind the times. Food for Thought is a standard text here in town, and if you purchase it, I can send you a list of the fabulous recipes everyone loves.
For the vegetable lover, there is a book native to Wisconsin called From Asparagus to Zucchini. It lists vegetables from A to Z, tells you how to use/store/eat/cook them, and includes two or three recipes for each one submitted by local chefs and community supported agriculture farmers. You could give the book along with a selection of organic vegetables or cookware, and be a hit! Thanks Maggie!
Tuesday Morning also had a nice collection of glassware, including Bodum glasses, Armetale serving pieces and funky vases.
A vase filled with a couple of bunches of astromeria from the grocery store (hold upside-down and shake gently before purchasing - if flowers fall off the bouquet is old!) makes a nice hostess gift. Cut the flowers short so they bunch just above the neck of the vase, and strip off the leaves that would be in the water so they don’t stink.
Speaking of collections, if someone you know collects Santas or angels and you want to add to the collection, Tuesday Morning had a huge selection of these as well as nutcrackers and reindeer.
Alternatively, you and a couple of equally stymied relatives could get together and start a collection of something for that impossible-to-buy-for person and that will provide you with a gift idea each year. One Christmas my sisters gave me a couple of funky Jonathan Adler pieces that I adore, and others have added to the collection over the years.
My one concession to Martha Stewartness is that I buy beribboned photo ornaments from Exposures every year and make one for each boy with a wacky picture in it. (That’s a big fat lie, as I forbid the boys to touch them, and they’re totally for me.) Anyway, for a while they were hardly noticeable on the tree, but when I’ve done this year’s we’ll have thirty-three, and it’s fun going back and looking at them each year. This is a good gift if you’ve hung out with a friend or relative in situations where you have pictures of their kids.
Tuesday Morning had a nice collection of picture frames– mainly the 4×6 size. I realized that someone in Bill’s office would think that he had three babies, as I haven’t updated his photos of the boys in a while.
I’m not out of ideas yet! How about a rosemary plant or frozen homemade soup for those who live alone and aren’t inclined to cook for themselves?
A subscription to Mental Floss magazine will keep a reader entertained!
Maybe you need a gift for someone who has a beach or lake house, or loves baths, or… needs a towel. Costco had some plushy pastel bath sheets for $17 that would be beautiful monogrammed and presented as a beach towel.
My mother gave bath towels and sheets as presents under the theory that people never buy these for themselves. It was a wonderful idea– sheets are worth spending a little more on because you use them every night, and now is a good time of year to get a deal on them.
Beach supply replacement would make a good gift as well, now that I think of it. You could buy the big LL Bean tote from my previous post, (my friend has one that says “I’m The Mom!”) and fill it with some goggles, suntan lotion, beach towels, chapstick with sunscreen and call it a day. How imaginative you are!
Buying for a wine lover? One reader noticed a wine refrigerator at Target online for under $200.
Over at MOO you can buy calling cards, stickers, postcards, and other paper goods. They have a host of pre-made designs, or you can upload photos to the site. If you’re making homemade food for people, this would be a cute place to have stickers made to place on jars. I’ll let y’all brainstorm other ideas for this site, because it’s chock full and the prices are reasonable.
I know you’re tired of reading, and I’m tired of typing, so I’ll wrap up with Uncommon Goods, which always has good ideas. On the home page, I love the monkey slippers. Also see the agate coasters, the geography pillows, hand painted wine glasses, (all their glassware rocks), and the runaway alarm clock.
Yo, I’m tired. And freaking out that Finn is attending his first boy-girl party tonight. Thank God I found out about the female presence just before the party started, and was able to encourage him to brush his teeth and apply deodorant before the big event.
My final installment will be gifts for your spouse, kids, and anyone else I forgot, with an emphasis on romantic surprises your lover will love.
Am I the only adult fighting with her child about the proper moves to Soulja Boy?
Last night the boys and I watched some of the Music Awards, but what should have been a relaxing evening of music quickly disintegrated into a shouting match between Finn and me. It was totally his fault. He was teaching Porter and Drew how to do the Soulja Boy dance, but was leaving out the all important third step: the “lean wid it.” He refused to admit his mistake until I dragged everyone to the computer to watch Soulja Boy himself go over the moves.
Watch and see for yourself, know what I’m sayin’?
Thus instructed, we went upstairs to practice, or Drew and I did, while Finn sulked on the couch and UNBEKNOWNST to me, took illicit video of us diligently rehearsing. It’s most humiliating, especially as we had no music and I was wearing my pajamas.I have no shame, I’m posting it anyway:
Hey, remember that time I wrote about What Not To Wear In Bed? Bill took one look at these comfy Kohl’s pjs and pronounced them supremely unsexy. I’m only wearing them because he was out of town.Surprisingly, those are also Drew’s pajamas. His strategy is to take a shower at night, put on his clothes for the next day and sleep in them to save time the next morning. He has it all figured out, that boy.Not caught up with the Soulja Boy craze? Better watch and learn before Thanksgiving so you can pretend you have your finger on the pulse of America.
******************************
I had hoped to publish an installment of the Gift Guide each day, but that has proved to be a tough assignment with everything else that’s going on. I know time is of the essence, however, so check back here frequently. I have everything drafted, and need only to add the glittering prose to tie it all together.
To Use the Pickle Player: Click the show you want to hear, press play, sit back and enjoy. To read the show notes click HERE.
In "It's Natural" I will tell your kids about the birds and the bees, but YOU must stay in the room and perform the coital finger movements.
I read this ten years ago and am reading it again. I want to read *Stargirl* but must avoid the library until Porter locates lost books.
The Boys Are Loving
Hooray-- there's a sequel to the original Diary. The guys are snarfing it up.
Porter finished all the Harry Potter books so I started him on A Wrinkle In Time, and he's enjoying it. I bought the whole set so he'd have plenty to read for the next few months.
After finishing the Harry Potters, Drew turned to the Hardy Boys. He can't tell a story "in a nutshell," so I've heard all about the missing jalopy, and the red wig. Solve the mystery already!
, 
or 
and tuck a wooden spoon and spatula under the ribbon on the outside.
is a standard text here in town, and if you purchase it, I can send you a list of the fabulous recipes everyone loves.
. It lists vegetables from A to Z, tells you how to use/store/eat/cook them, and includes two or three recipes for each one submitted by local chefs and community supported agriculture farmers. You could give the book along with a selection of organic vegetables or cookware, and be a hit! Thanks 
