Overgifting

[MKCP5]

M favorite souvenir for my DD has been her italian link bracelet. The charms are inexpensive and she loves collecting them. She has two bracelets now, she wears them all the time, and it's not more stuff all over the house for me to pick up! I liked it so well I got one too. DS is tougher though. He did buy himself a watch last time and that was a great choice. It is the millions of LEGOS from the LEGO store that kill me!

11 more days to go!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[JPN4265]

You can never over gift for your kids.

 

[Figaro's friend]

Gee ... that sounded pretty snarky! Does Santa come to your house? Does he see kids are that both naughty and nice? Does he bring gifts to naughty children?

Well ... Tinkerbelle will be filling in for Santa in a couple of weeks for my DD and her cousin. We are treating my sister's daughter to WDW so she can be a companion to my DD. The problem is that the girls only get along about 23 hours a day with about an hour of fighting and "That's not fair!" and "You care for her more than me!" thrown in for fun . To help smooth over the rough spots, Tinkerbelle will watch over the girls and if they are good all day, she will leave them a present under their pillow along with some pixie dust. Since Tink is just a tiny fairy, the present itself will also be very small but the girls will get a kick out of it. My guess is there will be a huge attitude adjustment when Tink leaves only pixie dust behind one morning because they were particularly rude the day before.

FWIW, a rewards system works for many, many parents. I reward with paper clips for everyday good behavior and cooperation in situations that would otherwise make my DD lose it. Her paperclips can be turned in at any time: a few for something small and a lot for a bigger item. My DD is a strong-willed, spirited child. The lure of the paper clips motivates her to get a hold of her temper and cooperate and it has worked wonders for our family. Many other families call this an "allowance", but at 5 she knows no value of money.

Again, I'm glad that you have a solution that works for your family ... but I wasn't snarky about your choices. I don't know why you feel the need to be snarky about other people's choices.

Nice b-mod program! Paperclips are a great idea for a tool. For those who don't understand, behavior modification is a teaching tool, with a plan, rather than "bribery."

 

[MrsPete]

Am I in the minority here?

You're in the minority, but you're not alone. At least, I'm with you.

My husband and I have made a conscious decision NOT to purchase "too much" for our kids -- this is not related to Disney, it's our lifestyle. When we go to friends' houses we see toys piled up everywhere -- so many that the kids can't play with them and can't appreciate them; TVs, DVDs, video game systems in young kids' bedrooms; etc. The result is kids who don't appreciate their things, and kids who think they're entitled to more, more, more. We decided to buy more carefully; for example, my girls didn't have tons of baby dolls; instead, we had one well-loved baby doll per girl -- and they received new doll clothes as gifts instead of new dolls. Though we could afford to give our kids more, more, more we do not.

My kids recieve a few toys at Christmas, and they receive one nice thing on their birthday (May and June). In between, we don't buy toys. We don't buy souveniers on vacation -- none. The kids get an allowance, and they're allowed to do extra chores for money. They have plenty of "stuff". In fact, despite our efforts, they have too much.

On the other hand, they take multiple vacations each year to a wide variety of places. When we travel, we think nothing of dropping $100 for a nice meal or to ride the water mice -- we want our children to have experiences, not junk. They have taken a variety of lessons over the years: swimming, gymnastics, guitar, skating. They have no end of books. The results of this "less stuff" parenting style has been overwhelmingly positive.

It has nothing to do with economics-I just can't stand the thought of having too many toys and not enough space to put them in. I would rather buy my kids quality over quantity any day than to bring home a whole suitcase full of junk that my kids will forget about a week later.

My thoughts exactly.

 

[christinadei]

I think that going to Disney is a gift in an of itself, however I do sort of go overboard. I always buy DS a shirt and make him a gift bag of disney stuff that I get cheap, usually from the dollar store before we go. Most stuff is useful though, disney coloring books, memo pads and stickers all keep him entertained adn glow sticks, etc that he can use at Disney. This way he has lots of new disney stuff and really doesn't ask for anythign else. So I may spend $20 on a bunch of small things before we go, but it probably saves me $50-100 in buying stuff for him there. If he does want anythiing else, which he usually doesn't ask for anything, he has to spend his own money, which he gets for birthdays and Christmas, etc.

 

[trayletha]

You can never over gift for your kids.

YEAH YEAH !!

 

[mlwear]

Can't find the original post to quote.
We have used the payment for cooperation idea in the past. I think this is a better way than hanging something over their head all day. But, is a bit more time consuming. I awarded points for good behavior. When we did it 1 pont = ten cents. Throughout the day, I could award points. Sometimes I had to say "you won't get your point if you don't stop _____". But, mostly would say "you did a good job ______, you get a point". On the last day of the trip, the points were converted to $ and they could buy their souvenir (sp). If you keep those coming, like every hour or so. You may want to use higher money amounts for points depending on what you want them to be able to buy. BUT, you have to keep track of the points! I recorded the tally whenever we were in our hotel room. My kids were honest about remembering their points (my oldest was 7). Now, that oldest is 10 he is not so impressed with dimes But it was good when it lasted. I could follow through on my warnings.

Anyway, this year, for the summer I attached a $10 Disney dollars/ per week clause to their allowance. It will work out perfect as when I started there were 7 weeks before out vacation. We will be a WDW for 7 days. I'm hoping they figure out that you can spend $10/day or save to buy something more expensive later.

Tinkerbell gifts. I am sort of tempted as this is our first Disney trip with the kids. I was thinking of something along the lines off a Tootsie pop, one of those cheap party favor blowing bubbles, etc. left each evening. Still trying to decide, but leaning toward Tinkerbell gifts that I have in mind.

 

[robinb]

Can't find the original post to quote.
We have used the payment for cooperation idea in the past. I think this is a better way than hanging something over their head all day. But, is a bit more time consuming. I awarded points for good behavior. When we did it 1 pont = ten cents. Throughout the day, I could award points. Sometimes I had to say "you won't get your point if you don't stop _____". But, mostly would say "you did a good job ______, you get a point".

That is just about what we do, except I use plastic coated paper clips. She gets a clip when she's good at specific times throughout the day and then extras (like every 10-20 minutes) when she's good in situations that she would normally lose it. The clips are roughly .25 each, mainly because my DD had her eye on something from Build-A-Bear Workshop that was $8-$10 and I didn't want it to be too much out of her reach. It's up to her to keep track of her clips .

We'll be doing both clips and Tinkerbelle gifts on our next trip. I don't like the all-or-nothing reward system either, so I was thinking about Tinkerbelle leaving clips behind. More clips when the girls were good and fewer if we had a major melt-down. *sigh* I am not looking forward to the joys of cousinly rivalry! That was the #1 reason I only had one child ... I can't stand it when kids fight.

 

[mlwear]

The paperclips are a great idea rather than my "points". They are tangible and I love that the child has to keep track of them.

 

[Disneyonmymind]

I just scanned over the posts but I thought I'd add our experience on our recent trip with DD9. Before this trip, DD9 received $15.00 in Disney Dollars from a relative for a birthday gift. I told her to take her time and look things over before she spent it.

As it turned out, she became a major tight wad, and didn't want to spend her $15 bucks on anything. The last day, I told her it was now or save it for next trip. She finally selected a few small items, (washcloths & pens, as I remember) including some for her 2 year old sister, and had a dollar left over.

I had read this advice (to give them their own money) on the DIS Board but I was amazed at how well it worked with my DD. I had planned to buy her and DD2 each a few things but they didn't seem to want anything. I did get them each a hat. Also, they each made about a dozen pressed pennies and I bought them a pressed penny book. We really held down the souvenier spending without even trying.

Jackie

 

[DisneyMomx7]

We're guilty of doing the "tinkerbell gifts" . I know that in a year or two the kids won't believe in the magic the way they do now. Even this year oldest dd (7) is questioning - 6 and 5 year old still believe whole heartedly. So soon tinkerbell won't leave the gifts but I'll have the memories of them waking up so excited and full of magical beliefs. To me that was worth the price of every gift I bought. Most are inexpensive, dollar store Disney things, or Disney store clearance items, but even the things that were more expensive were worth it for me. JMHO.

 

[gbmom]

My husband and I are definitely guilty of overgifting. I know we will this time since it will be DD birthday trip. We have been giving her Disney dollars for her allowance and she has gotten some more money from relatives along the way that she will be bringing with, but I know I will go overboard and buy her whatever her little heart desires. She even just got her ears pierced in anticipation of buying cool disney earrings while we are there. I think if I had more than one child the spending would be controlled more, but with just one it is just too easy to spoil her rotten.

 

[Amii]

We have two kids who both have illnesses and our medical bills are huge. My kids always have enough food, clothes, etc. but we have to watch every penny. We scrimp and save to take our kids on vacation (always Disney) and it can take us years to save the money.

When we do finally go my kids do not even ask for anything at Disney. They are so excited to be there having fun without Dr's apts, etc for a whole week that they don't even want to shop. They want to ride rides, see parades, and just be kids.

We usually buy my kids something from Disney and that is good enough for them. When we went last year we bought one of my sons a Stitch stuffed animal for a surprise one night and you should have seen his face! He still carries it around everywhere with him.

Sometimes I wish I could do more for my kids, but it is enough for them.

 

[Bugsmom73]

I love the paper clip idea. DD is very strong willed and that is just perfect for what I am looking for with her. When dd was our only, we tended to buy her a bunch of junk and a lot of books, I don't begrudge the books though. We have trimmed our excessive spending, way down. For our next trip, we will each have about 50 dollars to spend. if we see something really neat, we will consider buying it. DD will also have her disney money too. We will do a special gift in the room when we get there for our kids and our friend.

 

[disneyjunkie]

I'm an overgifting mom, and I'm proud of it.
I think WDW is a vacation not a gift.

 

[estherhead]

This is actually a huge parenting question in my mind. One which I debate with myself regularly... Just because I have the money to get it for you, should I? I made a decision about a year ago or so to stop buying my kids whatever they wanted. We put a freeze on any gift buying for a month. I didn't even let them have a quarter to ride mall horsies. My thought process behind this was at 3 and 4 I was training them that all you have to do is ask, and your wishes shall be granted, which we all know in real life is not true. In real life you must work for what you get. And my actions were leading to a lot of begging and whining in stores which is both embarassing and frustrating.

So during this month we cleaned out all toys in their room that weren't precious to them (about 3/4 of the toys: TONS!) and sold them and used the money to redecorate and organize their room. They loved the new, uncluttered look and after that month they had been trained to not ask for much and how hard it is to make any money at all. They don't even know the difference between a quarter and a dime, but they know that money doesn't grow in mommy's purse. And they see how hard I work to make and save money.

Anyway, as for the WDW being the gift, for my little girls that just isn't the case. Unless it is tangible and something they can hold and take home, it isn't a great day. So I am going to buy stuff at the discount mall down there on the first day and then give them that on the days we're in the parks so I don't have to spend a bunch of hard earned money on full Disney prices. And I thought I'd do the DTD My Little Pony idea since they'll be taking their box of ponies anyway. Plus I'm making books of activities for the ride down there and daily journal for them which they will LOVE! And as a baker, I'll be making Mickey shaped cookies on a stick which they'll help me decorate.

Plus I'm always a sucker for a balloon. They are cheap, exciting, and last the entire week in our rented house.

The wonderful thing about my new plan is if one of my girls ask me for something I know it is because they REALLY REALLY want it. Then I can make my judgements based on real desires instead of a desire for every little thing their eyes see.

Whew... Got more than you bargained for with that question!

 

[skiwee1]

I'm an overgifting mom, and I'm proud of it.
I think WDW is a vacation not a gift.

I so agree! I never make the vacation out to be a gift. It is a vacation for all of us to enjoy. I guess that is why I never understood the "take a WDW trip instead of giving Christmas presents" thing either. I think the gifts are icing on the cake and I thoroughly enjoy buying them. I go crazy on all our vacations and it just makes it that much better.

 

[rt2dz]

The one thing that I've seen no one point out, is that there is a HUGE difference between buying, buying, buying at every little whim every day of your life and being generous on vacation--and that still doesn't mean buying every little thing.

I never make the vacation out to be a gift. It is a vacation for all of us to enjoy. I guess that is why I never understood the "take a WDW trip instead of giving Christmas presents" thing either.

I totally agree with this. I had said something similiar in a previous post. But we do have seperate saving accounts for retirement, emergencies, our kids college educations, vacations, just for fun money, and Christmas. We don't replace one/dip into one for the other.

Last thing I want to add is that I love the paperclip idea for on the go. We have one of those little galvanized buckets and marbles. Everytime the kids go out of their way to be good, they get a marble. For example, if DS4 is intently playing with a toy but his DS1 really wants it and he just gives it to him to be nice, he gets a marble in his bucket. It has to be beyond expected behavior. And then when he acts up--i.e., throwing a temper tantrum-- he looses a marble. When the bucket is full, he can pick a treat. Sometimes, he picks a toy. Usually he picks to do something--go to a favorite park we don't visit often, go to the zoo or children's museum (to which we are members), eat popcorn and watch a movie in Mom and Dad's bedroom at night. It takes about 400 marbles to fill the bucket.

 

[crisi]

Whereas some of the best gifts I've gotten have been vacations. I'd much rather get the experience than the thing. We gave my mother a trip to San Francisco (with her daughters) for her 60th birthday. We are giving my parents a cruise (with us) as several years worth of gifts and a big thank you.

 

[skiwee1]

Whereas some of the best gifts I've gotten have been vacations. I'd much rather get the experience than the thing. We gave my mother a trip to San Francisco (with her daughters) for her 60th birthday. We are giving my parents a cruise (with us) as several years worth of gifts and a big thank you.

But we do both. We take vacations and give the gifts too. We don't do one of the other. So we get the best of both worlds so to speak. We take vacations and buy plenty of souveniers too.