Alan & Brenda Leonard

> DH and I have had the discussion before about how to keep gifts (i.e.
> birthday and Christmas) special, when throughout the year we pick up
> learning type stuff - books, crafts, learning toys etc. Maybe it's just
> because our oldest is just 3 1/2, but it's hard for him to distinguish
> between the two things right now. Books are a lot of this, because they
> are something I've always bought a lot of so whenever I find a good
> source of used kids books I pick some up.

I give a toy or two of the non-educational variety for these -- the kind of
stuff kids like but really are not vastly educational in and of themselves,
and I'm not likely to spend money on during the year. Also, we are building
a tool set for our son, so he always gets a tool for these occasions and
looks forward to that (screwdriver, hammer, wrench, etc.).

I know this isn't what you're asking, but have you considered making those
kind of occasions more about the non-gift stuff and just doing the holiday
stuff together - pagents, church, decorating, baking, etc. Birthdays might
be harder with that, but surely somebody will have some good ideas!

brenda