nighttowll
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Jun 29, 2013
- Messages
- 1,818
Ok first, I love the post with World War Z and animal nursery in the same paragraph! Just highlights how hard this is.
Twin girls, just turned 11 and older sis will soon to be 13 at Christmas. The last few years we've pretty much done most of what's been mentioned: clothes, makeup, jewelry, purses, anything Justice, anything arts and crafts, scooters (regular and electric) iPods, Wii games, DS games, and gift cards.
They seem to like hands on stuff they can do the best, toys they usually just get bored with after awhile. One still loves little pet shop, but I've noticed she hasn't been playing with them as much this year, so pretty sure that's coming to an end.
A few things I haven't seen mentioned:
Radio controlled helicopter
This was a big hit for us, lots of pleading for this one
Concert tickets
Last year TSO was playing right after Christmas. We gave the 12 year old two tickets so she could take a friend. It was a huge hit. I was surprised by how much she loved it. This was a bday / Xmas present though due to the expense. I'd recommend going to anyone who has never seen them, in my opinion it's well worth the money to see them at least once. But any concert ticket could work.
A makeup/beauty book
In our extended family, every bday when the kids finally reach the I'm growing up stage, ready for makeup, ready for more serious stuff age, we do a gift basket for them. Kind of like a welcome to womanhood thing. We include makeup, fancy soap, maybe a scarf and a book. We always get a book that teaches them how to apply makeup, but also one that talks about self esteem, how to dress respectfully, eat healthy, etc. We get ones geared toward the tween age. We have used a couple different ones by Bobbi Brown that were great. The girls really seem to love them, even the non readers. The twins haven't got their books yet, but the 12 year old got hers last year. It's been a huge hit.
Sewing machine with lessons from JoAnne's
The lessons were a huge hit
Voucher for a day trip / girls trip
We live in between 2 large cities, so the girls don't really get to eat at great restaurants or do special stuff like the zoo, IMAX, big mall, unless we travel couple hours and make a day trip of it. They always look forward to these trips. Especially, if they are one on one, and they don't have to share me with their sisters.
Angel tree
Ok this isn't really a present, but we did this last year, and they are already talking about wanting to do it again this year. I let each of them pick an angel from the tree, and they got to do the shopping for the angel. They had more fun picking out stuff for the angel than for themselves. We did it on Black Friday, only way to afford 3 angels. I'm pretty sure if I told them doing this counted as one if their gifts, they'd still want to do it. It was a great experience to see kids who have everything wanting to help others, and this is the only Christmas related activity they have asked to do again this year.
Twin girls, just turned 11 and older sis will soon to be 13 at Christmas. The last few years we've pretty much done most of what's been mentioned: clothes, makeup, jewelry, purses, anything Justice, anything arts and crafts, scooters (regular and electric) iPods, Wii games, DS games, and gift cards.
They seem to like hands on stuff they can do the best, toys they usually just get bored with after awhile. One still loves little pet shop, but I've noticed she hasn't been playing with them as much this year, so pretty sure that's coming to an end.
A few things I haven't seen mentioned:
Radio controlled helicopter
This was a big hit for us, lots of pleading for this one
Concert tickets
Last year TSO was playing right after Christmas. We gave the 12 year old two tickets so she could take a friend. It was a huge hit. I was surprised by how much she loved it. This was a bday / Xmas present though due to the expense. I'd recommend going to anyone who has never seen them, in my opinion it's well worth the money to see them at least once. But any concert ticket could work.
A makeup/beauty book
In our extended family, every bday when the kids finally reach the I'm growing up stage, ready for makeup, ready for more serious stuff age, we do a gift basket for them. Kind of like a welcome to womanhood thing. We include makeup, fancy soap, maybe a scarf and a book. We always get a book that teaches them how to apply makeup, but also one that talks about self esteem, how to dress respectfully, eat healthy, etc. We get ones geared toward the tween age. We have used a couple different ones by Bobbi Brown that were great. The girls really seem to love them, even the non readers. The twins haven't got their books yet, but the 12 year old got hers last year. It's been a huge hit.
Sewing machine with lessons from JoAnne's
The lessons were a huge hit
Voucher for a day trip / girls trip
We live in between 2 large cities, so the girls don't really get to eat at great restaurants or do special stuff like the zoo, IMAX, big mall, unless we travel couple hours and make a day trip of it. They always look forward to these trips. Especially, if they are one on one, and they don't have to share me with their sisters.
Angel tree
Ok this isn't really a present, but we did this last year, and they are already talking about wanting to do it again this year. I let each of them pick an angel from the tree, and they got to do the shopping for the angel. They had more fun picking out stuff for the angel than for themselves. We did it on Black Friday, only way to afford 3 angels. I'm pretty sure if I told them doing this counted as one if their gifts, they'd still want to do it. It was a great experience to see kids who have everything wanting to help others, and this is the only Christmas related activity they have asked to do again this year.
She is very crafty - yesterday I was in Hancock Fabrics and found a rolling organizer bag with zebra print. It was on the clearance table. I got it for $27.00 instead of the original price of 70.00. It is not something I even had in mind but I know she will love it! 
I plan to put some new craft supplies in it. I might have to check out the 
