Apologies for raising this topic before Halloween, but the holiday catalogs all arrived this week and they got me thinking...
This Christmas will be the first for our daughter, Alena, who is the 1st grandchild on both sides of our family. Family members already adore buying her things whenever they are inspired, including toys, clothes and books. Like most kids (I think?), Alena tends to prefer playing with real household items over toys, so the majority of her stuffed animals and toys get ignored. I have done my best to borrow from friends all the different baby gear and toys she might use at a certain stage, so that I can give them back and not amass a huge collection of plastic crap. The challenge lies in how to encourage/guide family members in their very generous desire to give. Does anyone have ideas of gifts I could suggest that would be fun, useful and longer-term for a 1-year old? I live in D.C. so the zoo and museums are free (otherwise season passes would be great), and the only other idea I have is a gift certificate to a nice photo studio for portraits (but that's really for me!).
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3 comments:
Hi, Erica.
Here's one suggestion. One of Maya's favorite belongings is her miniature armchair from Pottery Barn for Kids. It's a nice-looking piece of furniture, but scaled-down to be kid-sized. Maya climbs on it, sits in it to watch Sesame Street, and piles things onto it when she's in an organizational, taking-count-of-her-toys kind of mood. We keep it in our living room, and it looks nice there. (Seth and I have even been known to sit in it with the laptop on occasion.) So that's one non-plastic-toy idea that would last her for many years...totally know what you mean about the toy tsunami...
-Maureen
I am with Maureen about the chair...we have the anywhere chair from pottery barn and it is a family favorite. Also, a sleeping bag it something that we got for our daughter when she was one. She uses it at my parent's house. She sleeps in it and uses it to snuggle in front of the tv. It was a great gift that she will be able to use until she is at least 10 or 11. Some of our family gives the girls checks and a book or other small toy. That is so nice so that they will have a little nest egg that we can all add to over the years.
I love the chair idea and second the sleeping bag suggestion- we love ours for camping-
I love using Christmas to teach little ones about the Spirit of Christmas and giving-
You could use great organizations like Oxfam or the World Wildlife Foundation where your family member could buy your daughter 50 trees (for example) that are planted by Oxfam, or a goat, which is given to a family in South America etc.
Your daughter would get a cute card with the picture of the thing that was given and an explanation of how it helps whoever it went to. Then you could keep the cards and remind her when she's older of how much good one person can do etc. :)
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