Baby’s First Christmas: A Gift-Giving Tradition
It’s the most wonderful time of the year! I love Christmas and it’s even more special having a little one to spend it with this year. It’s our first Christmas as a family of three and I’m so excited to start all the family traditions together!
I 100% know gifts are not the reason for the season - but, gift giving is my love language and I tend to be an over giver (and an over spender…whoops!) when it comes to picking out things for people I love.
Alex and I both wanted to put something in place that would not only limit the spending, but would also limit the amount of gifts we were buying for our kids. More so, we wanted our gifts to have use and meaning, rather than something that would be opened and used on Christmas morning and shoved into a closet for weeks to come. Turns out, the solution we found is a cute little gift-giving tradition I think we will carry on for years and future kids to come. We didn’t create the tradition by any means, but the beauty of this tradition is adapting it to make it your own - and we did just that!
The tradition is simple - first, I puchased these cute little wooden gift tags. I wanted something that would hold up so I could use them year after year, and these are so cute I couldn’t resist. I also liked the idea of being able to use them on either wrapping paper or gift bags - whatever we decided to use that year! There are a ton of other options on Etsy as well - some with different sayings on them and even personalized ones if you have multiple kids in your household! There are 4 gift tags included and on the gift tags you’ll find things like ‘something you want’, ‘something you need’, ‘something to wear’, and ‘something to read’. There’s nothing on them that screams “Christmas”, so if you wanted to use these for birthdays too, you definitely could! I then picked out 4 different gifts that fit into these four different categories.
#1: Something you want - this is the big ticket toy option.
A ball pit filled with balls! A neutral colored one at that ;) This was our splurge item, but still so much cheaper than some name brand ones out there! That’s the nice part about gift giving this way though, you get to choose how much you want to spend! Since Beckham’s birthday is less than a month after Christmas, we decided to get him this for both Christmas and his birthday. Plus, I know we will get so much use out of it when we’re cozied up inside for these long winter months ahead of us. I ended up purchasing 2 packs of 100 balls to go inside. There were mixed reviews on how many balls fills a ball pit, so if we have to buy more down the road, we will do that! I’ll keep you posted on that as neither the balls nor the ball pit has arrived yet.
#2: Something you need - Anything your child is in need of.
New sleep sacks! Beckham was badly outgrowing his old ones, so it was time for an upgrade! I’m not sure what it is about these Zipadee-Zip sleep sacks, but they are pure MAGIC! Beckham will not sleep without them, and I kid you not, he instantly calms down when we zip him in. They have a variety of colors, designs and sizes as well!
#3: Something to wear - This one is pretty self explanatory. A new clothing item or outfit for your kiddo!
These Zara sweatshirts are the cutest! So reasonably priced, comes in a few other colors and it’s customizable as well! I got ‘BECKHAM’ embroidered on his!
#4: Something to read - Some sort of book or magazine your child can read!
I’m a big Joanna Gaines fan and Beckham is a big bookworm, so when I saw her book The World Needs Who You Were Made to Be on sale during Black Friday, I couldn’t resist. Children need to be told how important their uniqueness is in this world, and this book does a good job at that! The illustrations are adorable, and I love the inclusiveness, too! Well done, Joanna Gaines!
That’s it, that’s the tradition! It’s so simple, but so fun, stress free and organized. Years down the road, there won’t be questions about how many gifts our kids will be getting and it’ll require them to think hard about their wants, needs and interests while making their wishlist. Plus I think this helps take some of the “materialistic” pressure off of Christmas. Try it out, make it your own and see how this little gift-giving tradition works for you and your family!
