Do you treat your godchildren differently?

[skuttle]

My SIL called us today and asked if we would be godparents to her new daughter. We, of course, agreed. SIL also has a 7 year old son. For holidays/special occasions, my DS's godparents always give him a gift plus a savings bond since he's their godchild. I thought that would be something nice to start for our new godchild, but I'm worried that it will seem odd since we never did that for our nephew. DH and I are thinking about just treating them the same in terms of gifts since they are brother/sister. Any advice?

 

[Kimberle]

One of my nephews is my Godson. I do not treat him any different than my other nephews. My sister is my dd's godmother. She does not treat her any different than her other nephews.

 

[aprilgail2]

I always did&bought more for my godson than anyone else....he was my only godchild and I LOVED to spoil him...after he got sick he just got spoiled more and more yet he was NOT a "spoiled" type child, never asked for anything or screamed he wanted something.

 

[Rajah]

I think it would be something very nice to do for both of them, but since they're brother and sister, I wouldn't treat the godchild any differently.

 

[Lewski709]

Being a godparent, for my choices, had to do with religion. So, no I wouldn't do anything different for them except for religious occasions. I would just make sure you know what is expected (by the parents).

 

[TEENEE]

My niece is my goddaughter. I don't do anything for her that I don't do for my nephew. They are not siblings but only 6 months difference in age. Since they are together so often and so young I don't think they would understand why one gets more than the other. I don't want to cause problems so they are treated equally.

 

[minniecarousel]

DH & I are Godparents to one of my nephews (a triplet) and DH's niece, plus I am Godmother to one of my other nieces. I don't treat any of them differently from their siblings. One of my brothers & one of my sisters are godparents to our older son, & my brother has ALWAYS given him more than to our younger son. This was glaring one Christmas when he & his wiife gave a larger than usual check to our oldest and nothing to our youngest. Younger DS's godparents are my DH's sister and her husband. She was ill for many years and died 2 years ago. So, understandably, they didn't treat either of our DSs differently. My point being, I believe that it's best to treat siblings the same. JMHO

 

[disykat]

No. The only difference in my treatment is that I give my Godchildren a small religious themed remembrance on the anniversary of their baptism each year. Other than that they're treated the same as their siblings. (I'm not related to any of my Godchildren.)

 

[jkovick]

I have two Godsons and I do extra things for them. In my family it is very much the norm and understood that "extras" are done by the Godparents. We give extra gifts on occasions, buy savings bonds for them and took our 1st Godson to WDW for his 13th birthday. When our 2nd Godson is older we will take him too! We also make a special point of attending school events, church events, etc that our Godchildren participate in. You should do what feel right to you.

 

[vald1977]

When my brother and I were young, we each were treated a little differently by our respective godparents. For our family, it worked out fine since we both had godparents who gave us a little "more". If if had been a case where only one of us had active godparents I could see where there might be a problem.

I think you should do what you feel is best.

 

[Gupsmom]

Our oldest neice is my DH's Goddaughter. We used to mail a savings bond to her (to her parents) every birthday on top of the gift we brought to her birthday party (we go to all our nieces and nephews birthday parties..with a gift). This way, we were providing something for her without the other 3 kids knowing we were doing anything special. We eventually stopped doing this because the other 3 sets of godparents never sent anything. We love all our nieces and nephew and we didn't want to appear partial to one. It helped that their parents are financially secure (our niece wasn't going to depend on our bonds for college). Also, her parents (my Dh's brother and SIL) agreed that we should stop before the other kids caught on.

I don't think there is anything wrong with giving a gift as a Godparent. I would make the gift either religious or monetary (and give it directly to Mom and Dad), but that's just my opinion.

Jess

 

[Keli]

Unless I was pretty sure I wouldn't offend the parents or the older sibling I would treat the kids the same. I see a lot of potiential for hurt feelings by treating your godchild differently from her brother.