2024 Gift Guide - Holiday gifting

Buy locally while Canada Post is on strike!

These are all things that I have successfully gifted or received as gifts.

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FOR AN ADULT/TEEN (from personal to less personal):

• Commission a portrait from a local artist of the family and/or pets (or Wesley Snipes as Blade, whatever floats their boat). Get it framed, so you aren’t making extra labour.

• Tickets to a concert or comedian or sport event.

• Lessons together doing something fun.

• An indoor plant that fits their lifestyle.

• A comfy crewneck.

I wear this one from Society of Junior Grannies every week.

• Good pens (I like Tombow Fudenosuke hard tip brush pens, available in many stores).

• Giant fuzzy blanket.

• Basket of fancy food stuffs (like Utoffea).

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FOR A CHILD:

• Books¹

  • Graphic novels

    • Fiction: Baby-Sitters Club, InvestiGators.

    • Non-fiction: Science Comics.

  • Sex ed books

  • Science books - I liked

    • Maker Lab: 28 Super Cool Projects;

    • Star Wars Maker Lab; and

    • Amazing (Mostly) Edible Science.

  • Rachel Ignotofsky books (Instagram).

All of these are excellent

• Large box of plain Lego and base plates, for imagination purposes.

• Sticker books (duh).

• Fresh markers/bubbles/chalk, splurge on a big pack. Do NOT buy them Sharpies, trust parents on this.

• Sled (cold climate), skateboard (for summer), wagon (wee one).

• Tattly temp tattoos (locally, I can find them at the Winnipeg Art Gallery and other shops).

• Membership to local museum/zoo/ThunderDome and a commitment to take them there once a month.

• Snap Circuits - you can go a little younger than the official age recommendation, if the kid isn’t a total dingus

• Large bottle of vinegar, several boxes of baking soda, food colouring.

• Diet Coke and mentos.

• Microscope kit², or I guess a telescope if they might like space (ugh).³

• Pre-made chemistry or science kits are challenging because they can be quite influential (yours truly received one around 1993), but pricy for what they contain, and then you’re left with a box of random plastic crap, and many suggested experiments are something like “let this sit for 5 days and observe it” (big part of science but not a great rainy-day activity). There are about hundreds of experiments that you can do with simple stuff already in your kitchen (see my book recommendations above). I should create my own kit. With diet coke and mentos. If you do buy one, make sure it has a set of plastic test tubes in a stand, those are evergreen.

• Giant fuzzy blanket.

• Stuffy that resembles their pet or favourite animal.

• A giant doll house, probably.

  

  Christmas 1990

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I support Canada Post workers during their strike. Mail delivery is a public good that serves all citizens, including those outside of big cities and across the Arctic, and the workers deserve fair pay and benefits. My Uncle was a postal worker for many years and marched during their previous strikes. Here is how you can provide your support.

Image from Yukon Federation of Labour

A history lesson here - CUPW was the instigator for paid parental leave in Canada. Per definingmomentscanada.ca:

The 1981 CUPW Strike and the Fight for Parental Rights: On Tuesday, June 30, 1981, some 23,000 postal workers belonging to the Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW) walked out on strike after it became clear that the federal Treasury Board was not willing to negotiate on the union’s key demand for 17 weeks of paid maternity leave. During the subsequent 42-day strike, the workers faced harsh opposition from their employer, the media, and members of the public. However, they refused to back down. By disseminating a powerful education campaign and building alliances within the women’s movement, not only would CUPW go on to gain paid maternity leave for their members; their success set a precedent that would force the federal government’s hand to grant paid maternity leave benefits for all Canadian families.

I do recognize that this period of time may be a hardship on small businesses that rely on Canada Post, so we should do our best to support them regardless of whether we will receive an intended gift by an arbitrary day.

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Previous posts you might be interested in:

• All of them, my posts are awesome. Sometimes I go back and read them, just for fun. Same with looking at my social media profiles. It’s like listening to playlists you made for yourself. “Wow, I have great taste.”

1. Do not auto-purchase a book you loved when you were a kid without re-reading first, some of them are racist/sexist/etc. Oops.

2. Some kids make slides at home and then bring them to high school and try them on the microscope in grade 11 biology class and the teacher is mildly impressed. I’ve heard.

3. It’s just so BIG.