Minimalist gift-giving
It is not the first time that I’ve lost track of time and didn’t see Christmas coming, but this year this feeling is even greater due to the lack of preparations to travel back to Europe to celebrate the holidays with our families.
Although New York City is very different this year from other Christmases and does not offer the typical events of this time, I am very excited about staying, no planes in between, and slowing our pace considerably. Baking cookies, catching up on reading, crafting while drinking chocolate, in short, spending a lot of time indoors all sound like perfect plans.
Some of you have asked me about the gift approach for a minimalist, and while I’ve recently shared a few ideas in this post, let’s go a bit deeper.
The subject of Christmas gifts is never an easy matter, mainly because the act of giving involves two parties, the one who gives and the one who receives. Giving is fun, is all about thinking what someone else might like and lack, and creatively come up with something great. Find a sustainable alternative, maybe handmade, and a nice wrap accordingly.
The issue is that we often feel committed to giving because it is what is expected of us or because we need a gift to reciprocate. And try to gently change this by interrupting the inertia of having to buy a gift simply because it is Christmas, it is not an easy thing and can deeply upset others. Fortunately, the closest people who best know us accept it more easily because they know our values well.
Despite this, there is certainly some joy in surprising another person with something that we know they will enjoy. It doesn't have to be Christmas or a birthday, simply because we can think of a nice detail to pamper someone. Some ideas for these moments might be a good back rub, a special movie session with popcorn, a wine tasting, an afternoon of ice skating, learning a few crafts together, or a batch of fresh cookies. Subscribing to a workshop or museum are also my favorites.
Something that I also enjoy is supporting small artists and makers, with sustainable artisan objects that make life easy and beautiful, such as Florian Gatsby ceramics, the peaceful piece of art of my IG friend Saskia Saunders, Kathryn Davey's warm socks, a cooking kit, Julia's book, one of the precious wooden spoons that Vic carves with his hands and any of these delicious candles made in Brooklyn.
But what about the children, the real stars of these Holidays? There is nothing more exciting than admiring all this magic of Christmas through their eyes. But seeing them bombarded with gifts and ads is very scary and I don't think they need that much to be happy. At home,I like to emphasize traditions and offer lots of timeshares instead of gifts. Keeping it simple, I like to offer my daughter something to play with, something to create, something to read, something to wear. Something like any wooden Cinqpoints set, some books, a Simply Grey Life garment or any of Fábrica de Texturas’ creative kits.
