This thread has made me feel better – not necessarily that we all are in the same boat when buying for our parents, but as someone else mentioned, my mom has early signs of memory issues – she has not been officially diagnosed with anything, simply because she refuses to see the neurologist she was referred to. But the constant repeating of questions, writing stuff down, etc has been going on since Covid (just slowly progressing), and now its progressing to us wondering about how well she is maintaining household chores, cooking, etc.
So all that said, while the holidays are wonderful times, they can also be sad and overwhelming as loved ones age. As I was reading this thread it reminded me that I am certainly not alone.
We have my parents, and DH has both his parents (divorced) and a step mom as well. So we have a total of five parents that the holiday gift giving question comes back up every year. We are blessed that they aren’t on a tight budget themselves, and also they still gift us quite well at the holidays too, so it’s hard to not have something to give back in return.
My FIL and wife did tell us this year they did not want gifts. They want each of their adult children/families to get them a 8x10 canvas photo that can sit on the table below their wall mounted television We will do that, but I still feel awkward not doing more. They are both healthy and active so I am thinking about some sort of outing related giftcard for them. My daughter would also like to learn to crochet and I do not know how, so I am thinking of gifting my DD and step MIL the exact same Wooble sets so they could work on that together.
My MIL was widowed in 2019 and a year or so later sold their home and relocated back to her hometown (the city DH and I live in – but she also has a home in Florida) That said, she had a lot of house related stuff for a few years we could buy, but she told me a month or so ago she didn’t really have any needs. I know she is an avid reader both physical books and Kindle, and think I may look into the Book of the Month subscription service. While she is a lovely lady, she is a loner, so I may look into another subscription gift too – sort of the gift that keeps on giving.
As for my own parents – well, my mom has memory issues, and dad was raised very much to follow traditions. So while they do not need a single thing added to their home (they are basically hoarders already – they love thrift stores and estate sales and seriously go weekly), they would be confused and honestly hurt wtih no gifts. I have considered an outing for them but my mom would forget and then think we didn’t give them anything for Christmas (if she remembered…). For many years, due to the ridiculous amount of stuff already in their home, I have pretty much stuck to restaurant giftcards for them both. I may stick with that. I may get my mom a small diamond art set and see if I can get her set up at a table and show her how to do it while we are there. She used to be very crafty, but not sure she really cares enough about it now My sister has mentioned daily essentials like detergent, deodorant, etc.
Well I think it may have been more therapeutic than anything else for me to type all this out
I’m not sure I added any suggestions that are usable.
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they are also a huge pb&j fan with a particular brand/flavor of jam that can be more elusive to find/more costly than they like to spend so I have a 2 pack of the biggest containers of jif I could find and 6 jars of their favorite jam.
