Poll:Do You Give Gifts to Your Spouse?

[HFWR]

I got a guitar for my wife.

Pretty good trade, eh?

 

[Tom57]

Nothing at Christmas anymore. We are in our late 60's and buy what we want during the year. I do buy her good jewerly for some of her birthdays.

 

[Teacher Terry]

We stopped about 10 years ago. We go out for special occasions which we enjoy much more.

 

[audreyh1]

We have done special trips to celebrate big special occasions. Hawaii to celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary, fancy Paris hotel for DH 60th - even got the Eiffel Tower to light up! That last one worked out ahead of a planned trip.

We do often at least spend a day doing something fun.

 

[Scuba]

We have done special trips to celebrate big special occasions. Hawaii to celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary, fancy Paris hotel for DH 60th - even got the Eiffel Tower to light up! That last one worked out ahead of a planned trip.

We do often at least spend a day doing something fun.

Wow - very cool!

 

[Koolau]

DW is trying to get fit (losing weight and hitting the gym, etc.) So I'm getting her a FitBit this year.

Back in the day, I liked to buy her gold (such as a nice chain with perhaps a gold sovereign pendant.) YMMV

 

[TromboneAl]

We have a system that works pretty well.

1. I, for example, will ask for a particular gift—and by "ask," I mean that I will order it on Amazon and then show Lena what she's getting me for Christmas. We will also get each other smaller gifts as surprises.

2. Since, as the OP mentioned, we can buy anything we want, we choose presents that are relatively extravagant (for us). Things we'd normally not shell out the dough for.

For example, for Christmas Lena is buying me the new Oasis Kindle reader. $250 for an eReader is extravagant.

 

[TromboneAl]

even got the Eiffel Tower to light up!

Is that code for something else?

 

[Throwdownmyaceinthehole]

I like buying Christmas presents, but Hubby doesn't want anything unless he can eat or drink it, so this year is the Serrano ham - thanks Robbie!!!, and Scotch. For me, I expect him to read my mind and get me exactly what I want.....but I did give him a list. It doesn't help that BOTH of our birthdays are days before Christmas so we usually do a nice restaurant with our friends that have the same birthdays. One year when we were moving, he didn't get me ANYTHING and I was crushed. Still brings tears to my eyes....

 

[Katsmeow]

1. I, for example, will ask for a particular gift—and by "ask," I mean that I will order it on Amazon and then show Lena what she's getting me for Christmas. We will also get each other smaller gifts as surprises.

This is actually a pretty good idea.

All of this has been really helpful. I'm going to talk to DH and see how he feels about all this.

 

[audreyh1]

Is that code for something else?

Um, no LOL. But it was a joke since the Eiffel Tower lights up every night.

 

[FireFool]

We do gifts for: Christmas, St. Nicholas day and Birthdays (both in Jan). Valentines day gets just a card. For our anniversary we exchange cards and do a day trip somewhere to spend the day together, away from any "normal" house chores/activities. Lately we've gone biking somewhere. Going back to the gifts - Mostly it's about having something to open. We don't budget an amount and we don't compare $'s spent. I try to make it about the thought behind the gift. To do that I keep a running list of ideas for her, my kids, and myself (to offer up as suggestions when asked_, all year long by creating a repeating daily entry in my electronic calendar scheduled for 11/1 - 12/25. I found if I wait until December to come up with these ideas my brain generally fails me. For myself the ideas usually cover things I need or want, but just not right away. An example would be as I put our bikes away for the winter I noticed the tires on my bike need replacing before spring - something to put on the list. Another example is over the summer I was powerwashing my drive and a neighbor came over and offered to loan me his surface cleaner attachment. I was impressed how well it worked, grateful he made that day go much easier/better, but in general I don't like to borrow other peoples tools more than once. I could see myself using it yearly, starting with next summer, so on the list it went. For my wife I try to pay attention to things she likes or could use. When we have guests over she often offers tea - bringing out multiple boxes to select from. It occurred to me one such time how much nicer it would be to have a tray, similar to what restaurants use, at home - on my gift idea list it went. I purchased her one for St. Nick's day (a holiday that is important to her and traditionally gets small gifts or candy). Another time she made comment about how nice a telescoping mirror was in a hotel we stayed at and doesn't have one at home - on the list it went. She complained that her garden pruning shears weren't working real well, but she wasn't motivated enough to go to replace them on her own at the time - on the list it went. She's on the fence about replacing her phone. She's had it for 4 years and it was acting up for a while. but has gotten better with a battery replacement. If it broke during the year we'd replace it right away, but it's something she's o.k. "living with" for a while. So it's on the list, but we'll probably shop for that together. Without the list though both she and I would forget about these gift ideas. The list is a winner in that it creates some thoughtful and/or useful gifts. I will add though if one of us really wants something during the year we'll go out and buy it for ourselves (and sometimes that knocks an idea I have for her off my list).

 

[Red Badger]

Our gifts are time with each other. A nice dinner (in or out), a weekend away, a movie; something along those lines.

 

[Scuba]

We do gifts for: Christmas, St. Nicholas day and Birthdays (both in Jan). Valentines day gets just a card. For our anniversary we exchange cards and do a day trip somewhere to spend the day together, away from any "normal" house chores/activities. Lately we've gone biking somewhere. Going back to the gifts - Mostly it's about having something to open. We don't budget an amount and we don't compare $'s spent. I try to make it about the thought behind the gift. To do that I keep a running list of ideas for her, my kids, and myself (to offer up as suggestions when asked_, all year long by creating a repeating daily entry in my electronic calendar scheduled for 11/1 - 12/25. I found if I wait until December to come up with these ideas my brain generally fails me. For myself the ideas usually cover things I need or want, but just not right away. An example would be as I put our bikes away for the winter I noticed the tires on my bike need replacing before spring - something to put on the list. Another example is over the summer I was powerwashing my drive and a neighbor came over and offered to loan me his surface cleaner attachment. I was impressed how well it worked, grateful he made that day go much easier/better, but in general I don't like to borrow other peoples tools more than once. I could see myself using it yearly, starting with next summer, so on the list it went. For my wife I try to pay attention to things she likes or could use. When we have guests over she often offers tea - bringing out multiple boxes to select from. It occurred to me one such time how much nicer it would be to have a tray, similar to what restaurants use, at home - on my gift idea list it went. I purchased her one for St. Nick's day (a holiday that is important to her and traditionally gets small gifts or candy). Another time she made comment about how nice a telescoping mirror was in a hotel we stayed at and doesn't have one at home - on the list it went. She complained that her garden pruning shears weren't working real well, but she wasn't motivated enough to go to replace them on her own at the time - on the list it went. She's on the fence about replacing her phone. She's had it for 4 years and it was acting up for a while. but has gotten better with a battery replacement. If it broke during the year we'd replace it right away, but it's something she's o.k. "living with" for a while. So it's on the list, but we'll probably shop for that together. Without the list though both she and I would forget about these gift ideas. The list is a winner in that it creates some thoughtful and/or useful gifts. I will add though if one of us really wants something during the year we'll go out and buy it for ourselves (and sometimes that knocks an idea I have for her off my list).

+1
DH is pretty frugal so he waits until Christmas or birthdays to put things like a new jacket or other clothing items he wants on a list. And we both listen to each other's wants and note them for future gifting. This year about half of DH's gifts are things he specifically listed and the other half are my recollections of things he mentioned months ago, or just ideas I had.

Sometimes my ideas don't work out. Last year I bought him winter clothes for kayaking. Back to REI they went as DH doesn't want to kayak when it's below 75 degrees. Oh well.