Considering it’s the holidays and all, and you just may have holiday shopping on the brain, we thought we’d do something totally crazy and devote two entire episodes of Spawned to helping you with your holiday shopping! This week, we’re all about kids’ holiday gift ideas, lots of which are based on our own reader and listener questions. We share our own favorite picks from our 2015 holiday gift guide, ideas for kids who have everything, money-saving and budget tips, and tips on how to handle a huge list of family members who all want to buy stuff for your kids.
(Plus we think you’ll enjoy our fun little rant about Black Friday shopping — not that camping out front of a store in the freezing cold starting at 11PM on Thanksgiving isn’t good, wholesome family fun.)
You can listen to Spawned via SoundCloud right now (hey, why wait?), or just subscribe to Spawned on iTunes and listen in the Podcast app that comes totally free with your iOS device.
Links from SPAWNED Episode 24
– Don’t miss our 10th annual Holiday Gift Guide (Plus, check out the first post in our Holiday Tech Guide series: The coolest tech gifts for travelers.)
– Our own Black Friday deals post on Cool Mom Picks and best online tech deals on Cool Mom Tech.
– REI closed on Black Friday as part of the #OptOutside movement
– We rounded-up the best shopping apps so you can avoid the hectic in-person holiday crowds.
– Priceblink: an easy trick to save money online
– Find the best online coupon codes with Honey.
– 14 of our favorite small shops and online children’s boutiques and favorite stylish small tech accessory companies to help you #shopsmall for the holidays.
– Baby Buggy, one of our favorite charities. They accepts donations of baby goods and money to provide essentials like diapers to families in need all year round.
– Super cool craft gifts for kids including Kristen’s favorite idea for her oldest daughter, this colorful Janome sewing machine.
– DIY holiday gift ideas to keep the holiday spending down.
– Gabrielle Blair of Design Mom’s gifting strategy which we love.
– Liz’s kids each “adopt” an animal through the World Wildlife Fund each holiday. A great way to learn while helping!
– Kristen’s favorite gifts from the Cool Mom Picks Holiday Gift Guide include the Janome sewing machine above, and gifts for kids under $15 that really don’t feel like stocking stuffers. She really loves the cool Hanukkah gifts for kids category, too. (Even though she’s not Jewish!)
– Liz’s favorite gifts from the Cool Mom Picks Holiday Gift Guide include Sugarhai’s Kawaii gifts and lots of options in our gifts for kids under $15 including the emoji shoulder bag. Liz really adores personalized gifts for kids by Olliegraphic from Sarah + Abraham, like the personalized superhero plate found in the coolest superhero gifts for kids section.
Both Kristen and Liz like the cool music gifts category including this Marshall Acton Bluetooth speaker (a splurge!) and the more affordable personalized rock band poster .
We include personalized items in many of our Holiday Gift Guide categories, but we’ve also got a dedicated coolest personalized gifts section including amazing family portraits and other items we mentioned, including the personalized musical instruments from Scissor Mill shown here.
Phew! Thanks for tuning in, and we hope this helps some of you!
If you have any ideas for shows, questions, or even tough gift questions, we love answer thing. Feel free to email us at spawned@mompicksprod.wpengine.com (we write back, promise) or tweet us @coolmompicks with hashtag #SpawnedShow.
And hey have you left us a review or rating yet? If you like our show, we are super super grateful for the few moments you take to write a few sentences. It helps other people find our podcast, and well, it just makes us happy. (And psst..thanks to all of you who already have. Extra chocolate for you this holiday!)
