It’s so much fun to shop for kids! Oh who am I kidding? It’s not that much fun. It’s fun to shop for my own kids because I “get” them, and I know what will genuinely make them happy (or I have sneaky ways to make them want what I want to give them). It’s a little more “challenging” to shop for other people’s kids. Of course I want to impress the kid, and kids––at least young kids––can’t fake liking your gift (bad parents), so you risk an unhappy kid and a shattered shopping ego.
Aside from scoring points with the kid, I also want to impress the kid’s parents and anyone else who might be in the room when the lucky child is opening the gift. I want to give a gift that is cool but safe, new but not untested, offbeat but not offcolor. I want to give that gift the kid talks about for years (a little misty-eyed as they get older); the gift the kid’s parent then buys for other people’s kids because it was just so damn special. I want everyone else to cower behind their less thoughtful, less special gifts. I want the kid to say “wow Auntie, Santa has nothing on your gifts!”
We work hard for that squeal (kid) and “oh my!” (awed parents, grandparents, and neighbors) and sometimes we not only lose track of our budgets, and senses, but we lose sight of a few basic considerations.
Respect Parental Limits.
This is the boring but basic first consideration of gift-shopping for kids. You really do need to check with their parents. See if there are gift no-no’s and don’t disobey them to win cheap points with the kids. If they ask you to obey a one-gift rule, please don’t show up with five. If there’s a $20 price-limit, please don’t spend $120. They are most likely trying to teach their kids to be content with less, a lesson the rest of us never learned (hence our mountains of consumer debt). Some parents don’t set limits, but they’ll appreciate you asking, and you can at least make sure your gift won’t duplicate with something they’re already planning to give.
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