A2K Moms: what was your favorite present from your kids?

What about a group photo of the kids in one of those frames that records something and have them sing a Christmas song for her?

Or, spend the next few days getting some video of each of the kids in candid moments. Maybe ask them questions such as what's mommy's favorite color, fruit, joke, who is Santa, etc., and edit the video with some holiday music.

She's made me a bunch of things and I love them all -- especially Sculpey animals.

Probably my favorite-favorite thing though is my silver Ganesh pendant, which she selected on her own for Mother's Day when she was maybe 8? Around there. It showed real thoughtfulness (Ganesh is my favorite godling), and taste too (it's awesome, and I have worn it every day since she gave it to me).

That's one thing E.G. has had good luck with from when she was pretty little (from before 6, but not sure how young) -- take her to a store with things he knows I like, and let her choose something. She's chosen amazingly well.

He does some direction and sets spending limits, but not a lot.

The other thing I like best is just a card -- something hand-drawn on front, and then something hand-written by sozlet inside. No coaching, just whatever occurs to her. There were often misspellings and redundancy and bad grammar, but those are some of the things I cherish the most.

The card idea reminds me of something else I did for the grandparents that was a big hit. Two different years, she did a series of themed drawings. For one, it was "hand" drawings (outlines of her hand that she made into various creatures, like an octopus, with pompoms, googly eyes and other embellishments, on construction paper). Another year she did a single, extremely colorful and detailed drawing of a swamp scene.

I ordered a set of notecards from Shutterfly, which are intended to showcase photos but you can scan art too. So I did a dozen cards of each image (one each of the four hand drawings, then cropped four different parts of the swamp scene), and then took them all apart and re-assembled so that there were four different sets of notecards, each of which had sets of each of the four images (if that makes sense). (Each set of notecards had twelve cards total, three each of four different images.)

They looked great and the grandparents had fun using them.

Of course you don't have to do the different images. Would also be fun to have one image from each kid.

They seem to want to put words and stuff on 'em now -- before it was easier to get notecards with JUST an image -- but the "classic collage" (with only one image) looks like it would work:

http://www.shutterfly.com/cards-stationery/folded-note-cards

Is this just for Moms? I’m a kind of a mom/dad kind of guy lol.

I have heard through the grapevine Antonio will me making me a special present for Christmas, he is drawing me a picture of the tortoises and I will have it framed. Perfect gift

Awww...


I just checked prices on the notecards, it'd be $17 for a dozen notecards, so if you multiplied that by 3 (one image from each kid, then mix them so there are four of each image in three different packs of 12), that'd be $51 for three gifts. (Could be T, her parents, and your parents.)

Maybe not the main present for T but could be one from all three kids, and then they each pick out another present that's more individual (at least the girls).

I definitely liked that part, seeing sozlet's taste and thought process, what she chose and why.

Hmmm.....

Maybe a picture collage with miniaturized versions of kid art....

find her favorite 12 drawings from the kids and make them into next years calendar for her

think outside the handprint box

She makes her own calendar each year. She has definite ideas about how it should be done (and she's right).

As far as the handprint thing goes, I'd love to have had one of them every year so I could look back and see how they got progressively bigger, increment by increment.
One of my favorite gifts from my son is a little wooden Christmas tree ornament with his kindergarten picture decoupaged on it. You can buy the little wooden cut out ornaments, have the kids paint and decorate them and then take one of their little wallet sized school pictures and glue it on- put a ribbon through the hole and voila - a cherished keepsake she and they will enjoy for the rest of their lives everytime you all decorate the Christmas tree together.

From my daughter I treasure a card she wrote - she said, 'I think you're the best mom in the world because you're not afraid to have fun.'
Honestly - she could give me anything else in the world and it wouldn't mean more than that card does to me, and will for the rest of my life.

I think my favorite thing (which is hanging right inside my front door) is a series of hearts that he painted and then wrote "I love ______" inside of each one.




I really like the idea of doing a stepping stone every year, it's a nice way to mark the passage of time. It will be nice as the kids get older and can plan to do it themselves too.

Little Christmas ornaments are fun if the girls like crafting. It's something that can be pulled out every year. That kind of thing always opens my floodgates.