You won’t find these gifts at the mall, in any store, or on Amazon.com, but you will find them in your family heirloom collection for years, perhaps generations to come. Initially, your gifts won’t empty your wallet or deplete your bank account, but they will become permanent fixtures in your grandchildren’s lives. You also won’t find these ideas and items quickly turned from treasure to junk, relegated to the obsolete and irrelevant junk heap a few months after they’ve been unwrapped; instead, you will experience their continued presence within family traditions over time.
The essence of this type of gift giving lies in the presentation of elements and ideas from within oneself, one’s experiences, one’s values. As such, these gifts are nearly limitless in the positive, even transformational, effect they can have on the recipients, your grandchildren.
Grandpa Bill spent nearly two decades of his young life out west, where he became an avid hunter and fisherman. Of course, he was caught up in all the Western mystique, amassing enough sports paraphernalia to pique any child’s interest. In particular, Grandpa was proud of his collection of Western belt buckles, which he occasionally paraded to admire their unique ruggedness. As he began to share with his grandson stories of his hunting and fishing expeditions, he wondered how Zach would react to receiving the buckles as a ‘special’ Christmas present. The rest of the story is history. It was impossible to determine who got the bigger high, Grandpa or Zach, when the grandson opened the package. In fact, the luminous expression on Zach’s face when he opened his treasures paled in comparison to hearing Zach say that, of all the gifts he received this year, “…belt buckles were my favorite.” . Oh, and let’s not forget the hour Zach and Grandpa spent together on the Web researching the colorful story behind each buckle. In fact, when Zach returned home, he announced that he planned to use some of his Christmas money to buy a small safe to store his newly received treasures.
Grandma Ethel is retired and lives on a fixed income. She can hardly participate in or compete with the material hubbub that she brings each holiday. But she has an incredibly rich childhood past whose memories she wanted to pass on to her only granddaughter, Emily, for whom she provides after-school childcare. On Christmas morning, amidst all the trappings of little girl gifts, Emily found a Mystery Tour field trip ticket inside her sock. Grandma had included a walking and walking map of the historic sites that she and Emily would visit on their full day excursion. Of course, it included a lunch stop at Emily’s favorite ice cream parlor! On the day of the hike, Emily borrowed a family digital camera and took photos at each location along the way. By the end of the day, she had gathered pictures of the old chicken farm, the waterfall where Grandma used to swim, and the orchards where Grandma, as a child, had picked apples, strawberries, and pumpkins. A week later, Emily and Grandma sat down together and created a digital photo album, complete with script and music. And that’s not the end of the story! The following week, when Emily returned to school, her Mystery Tour Field Trip was the Christmas present she chose to present and share with her classmates.
Early in their marriage, the Ryans were fortunate to meet a young investor who taught them the power of compound interest and the potential of the stock market as an income generator/builder. Following the advice and aegis of their financial mentor, they started small, investing in a modest portfolio of unglamorous but reliable blue-chip stocks. Throughout their marriage, they had fun watching what started as a small savings grow into a respectable retirement fund. If only they could instill their successful financial strategies and instincts in their grandchildren. But how could the boring, boring concept of deferring immediate gratification for long-term results compete with the raucous here-and-now sensual barrage of TV commercials, mall frenzy, and peer pressure, all of it? inviting you to buy more junk? They had an idea! Earlier in the year, they bought shares of two stocks in companies whose products target the teen market. Throughout the year, they monitored the stock’s progress, recording its ups and downs in a simple spreadsheet. When the grandchildren opened their Christmas cards, they found a summary of the results of their actions so far, with a simple explanation of gifts. A few days later, Grandpa bookmarked and shared some places where the grandchildren could go to experiment with various hypothetical scenarios of compound interest formulas.
Probably the most empowering gift of all is the one the Martins gave their grandchildren several years ago. From the moment that children understood the concept of Santa Claus and Christmas and gifts, the grandparents began a tradition where, every year in early December, the children would choose from their daily newspaper a list of a child or a Anonymous needy girl whose Christmas promised to be naked without the generosity of a secret benefactor. Then, with a portion of the money each grandchild had saved over the year, Ryan’s grandparents would go shopping for appropriate clothes and toys for chosen children in need. It became such an anticipated ritual for grandparents and children alike that even through high school, grandchildren insisted on carrying on the tradition, and it’s hard to tell who enjoys their annual day together more: grandparents or grandchildren. .
Yes, we, the Boomer generation that became the poster child for rampant consumerism, can reverse this ‘gimme’ culture that pervades our society. We can, in fact, confront and confuse the addiction to spending and shopping. Grandparents are finding and giving sustainable gifts that keep on giving, treasures that will generate a substantial and far-reaching return on our investment for and in our grandchildren. Such intangible gifts of ‘rippling pebbles’ comprised the stuff of future family traditions and values.
