Trawling for ideas

If you have been a good detective and figured out what make your friends/loved ones/co-workers happy, now you can use that knowledge to start honing in on some great gift ideas -- best of all, you can do so without waking up at 5 a.m. and battling the hordes of people who choose to shop the day after Thanksgiving.

Here are two steps to get you going…no guarantees that you will find your gift yet, but this can help rev up your creativity to help you come up with some up with something exciting.

1. Make a list of key words for the giftees on your list: their names (first and last), kids’ names, pets’ names, hometown, their passions, their histories, and their futures (what they are looking forward to?).

2. Go online (aka shopping in your jammies) and use those key words to search. You are just trawling at this point -- gathering ideas and options, and getting the creativity started. Some of my favorite sites for this kind of research are CafePress, eBay, Amazon and the favorite search engine du jour (Yahoo, Google, Bing, whatever).

Once you start trawling, one idea will lead to another…and you just might get lucky. Think (carefully) before you buy anything -- if you find a cute “Jerry’s Pub” t-shirt but Jerry doesn’t wear t-shirts or drink beer, that’s not a good gift idea. But if you find a vintage model of the 1968 VW he drove and loved when he was 16, you could be on to something good.

Happy searching!

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I spy, with my little eye…

Another note as we gear up for Thanksgiving: if you are spending time with family / friends, take advantage of this golden opportunity to sit back (or stand up and help with the dishes, darn it) and be observant.

Pay attention. Be snoopy. Who are these people? What do they like? What makes them tick?

This is a good time to realize that gift-giving really is not about you – it’s about the person who is about to receive your gift (which is, of course, still TBD). Seems obvious, but folks have been known to spend lots of time together and still miss this opportunity for heavy hint-dropping.

So, here’s your challenge: think about them as individuals and consider their history (with you and without you). Who are these people? And why are they forcing you to wash their dirty dishes?

But seriously...take note:

- What are they passionate about? (Causes, sports, fashion, music, colors, TV shows, movies, celebs, travel, animals, history, books, careers, self-improvement…?)

- What makes them happy? How do they spend their free time? Or what do they wish they could be doing?

- What are their fond memories? What did they love when they were a kid?

- What do they do for a living now? Or what did they do when they first started working? What would they like to do for a living someday? Or what do they want to do when they retire?

- Where would they like to travel…or live? Where were they born?

- What are they wearing? (There will be a quiz on this later, so pay attention.)

- What is your favorite memory shared with this person?

Yes, it seems like I am being nosey. But you will thank me later (and your friend / family member will be under the impression that you find them fascinating, so everybody wins).


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