You don’t want to be that father – the one who buys gifts for the sake of it. Rather, you want to use your growing parental love as a vehicle to make the world a better place, and the gifts that you choose can reflect this. To make things easier for you, we have highlighted some of the best gift ideas to celebrate your growing family. The main tenets of these options are quality, value for money, environmentally friendly, educational, and just plain cute.
Sponsoring an animal
A young child will not have learned the art of appreciation yet, and often any gift that is bought and given says more about the adult giving the gift, than the child.
However, with some forward-thinking, you could invest in a gift that will teach empathy and compassion, and encourage interest and respect for the natural world. Sponsoring or adopting an animal that will grow up alongside your child is akin to giving the gift of another life.
Whether you go for the local donkey sanctuary or dog home or go wilder by sponsoring a tiger or elephant, you know that your money is being put to excellent use, protecting the environment, safeguarding another life, and marking the arrival of someone very precious to you.
Go as cute as you can
To every man reading this blog post, how many of you still have your childhood cuddly toy tucked away, much loved and immensely threadbare, at the back of a cupboard somewhere?
The world is full of these worn-out items of affection. But they were once new and fresh and waiting for someone to come along and claim them as their own little source of comfort.
They often say that it’s the cuddly toy that seeks out its potential owner, and the Jellycat range is one which has a number of endearing characters who are waiting for the right owner to come along.
If the match is a good one, the relationship between the Jellycat and your newborn will still be going strong decades later!
Invest in their future
If you have any understanding of the compound effect, you’ll know that whatever you put away or invest for your newborn has the luxury of time to grow and expand as your child grows into adulthood.
You may want to seek professional advice if you don’t have much knowledge about investing money for long-term growth. Whether it is in traditional savings accounts, bonds, or stocks and shares, you want to choose something that you can add to regularly over the years to see it grow and mature into a bottom line of real value. The funds can then be used to fund higher education or a deposit for a home – whatever you choose, your child will thank you for it in the future.
The best gift is your time
Ultimately the absolutely best gift that you can give to your child is your time. Too often, fathers particularly can get over-involved in working, which can inadvertently take priority over spending time with your child. Don’t fall into that trap. Make sure you set time aside to spend with your children – and set those times in stone. There is no substitute for the gift of time and love!