As the father of two daughters, now both adults, I’ve had at
least a few opportunities to present my share of birthday gifts with my
wife. Some of them were winners, and
some were…well, just gifts. And I won’t
comment on the gifts of cash or gift cards (although they were probably
appreciated more as the girls got older).
But without question, the ones both my daughters remember the most, and
still talk about to this day, are the “daddy gifts" they got exclusively from
me. They weren’t expensive, and my wife
didn’t buy them. In many cases, I made
them myself. Most of these gifts my
daughters still have, tucked away in closets and boxes and brought out from
time to time to show their friends.
Yes, sometimes they were embarrassed when Dad went a little over the top
with one of those gifts. In particular,
my younger daughter was a lot more vocal with her opinion of how people were
going to look at her all day long. But
I think deep down they secretly loved the extra attention they got on their
birthdays when friends would point and say, “What the heck is THAT?" and they’d
respond, “This is my daddy gift for my birthday."
How can you give your daughter something she’ll remember for
the rest of her life? Don’t worry,
gentlemen. You don’t have to shell out
for the cruise to the Bahamas or put a down payment on a new sports car. No, seriously, you don’t. Check out a few of these ideas and see if
you can find something that will let your daughter know just how much she means
to you.
Give her flowers – with a twist. I’m sure she’d love a nice floral
arrangement. Most women would. But what about a corsage? It doesn’t have to be extravagant. A small simple grouping of flowers in her
favorite colors will work nicely and doesn’t cost a lot. The bonus is it’s portable, and she can wear
it all day long, so that everyone around her knows that there’s something
special going on in her life today.
Give her a bouquet of a different type. Maybe she’s not into flowers. What about a balloon bouquet instead? Or a basket filled with her favorite snack
items? Perhaps she’d appreciate a beach
bag containing tanning oils and skin lotions, or an oversized towel rolled up
with scented soaps and bath oils.
You’ll need to do some detective work to find out what it is your
daughter enjoys, but the time involved will be worth it.
Give her a homemade gift. Over the years I’ve made many of the gifts I’ve given my
daughters. I started out with oversized
buttons, decorated with ribbons and beads.
I graduated to sashes, baseball caps, and t-shirts. Puffy paints, inexpensive charms, novelty
erasers, birthday cake decorations, and even battery-operated miniature lights
have found their way into some of the gifts I’ve created. Oh, and don’t forget to switch things around
for those special birthdays. For
example, on the 18th birthday I went from gaudy to classy, making
large buttons with gold and silver ribbons, and white lace hearts framing a
baby picture. These gifts too can be
worn all day long.
If you’re not one of those guys that knows your way around a
craft store, think of other things you can create. A homemade birthday card may seem corny, but your daughter
certainly won’t think so, especially if there’s a gift card tucked away inside
it. Maybe you’re a wordsmith and can
write a poem, putting it in a nice frame that would fit the décor of her
bedroom. If you’re computer literate,
check with your local office supply store about kits to make your own t-shirt
transfers. Take some of her favorite
phrases and pictures of her friends and herself, print them out on the transfer
paper, and iron them onto a t-shirt or nightshirt for her. All are simple gifts your daughter will
love, because they’ve come from you.
Have her gift delivered…or deliver it yourself. If the school your daughter attends will
allow it, have your gift delivered to her in her classroom. Better yet, make the time and play “delivery
boy" yourself. It’ll certainly get the
attention of everyone in the room when you walk in with your gift and present
it to her with a simple, “Happy birthday, sweetheart."
You might be thinking, “Okay, so you got them a few neat
birthday presents they thought were special and that ended up as keepsakes. So what’s the big deal?" Actually, sir, there are several big
deals. The first is that you took the
time and made the effort to give your daughter something that is totally and
completely from you. You’ve shown her
that you care enough about her to give her something of your self, something
that nobody else on this planet can ever do.
The message you send with a gift like this is that she is worth
something in your eyes. If you present
it to her publicly, or give her something she can wear all day long, you send
that message to everyone who sees her as well.
Talk about a major boost to her confidence level!
The second big deal is that at this stage in your daughter’s
life, you are the biggest male influence she has. She will look to you to find out what a man does, how a man acts,
how he thinks, and most importantly, how he treats the women in his life. And that will be the template she’ll use
when she starts looking for a man of her own.
You want to take every opportunity to show her that a real man respects
a woman rather than uses her. That he
treats her as an equal, not as a doormat.
That he believes her needs are as important as his own. You want to leave her with high standards so
she won’t go after just any guy that makes her heart flutter. And something as silly and seemingly
insignificant as a handmade card or a silly, oversized button can help cement
that standard in her mind and in her heart.
Oh, and there’s an added benefit, too. You get something out of it. What would that be? Well, for me it was my older daughter’s
sophomore year in college. I made her a
“birthday cap", a black baseball cap decorated with neon fabric paints, fiber
optic lights, glittery beads and shimmering ribbons. She wore it to every class she had that day. It was a few days later that she was able to
tell us about the reactions people had to her “daddy gift." One person asked where she got it, and when
she told him, he said, “Do you think he’d make me one?" Her response was priceless. “No," she explained, “he only makes these
for me." She’d learned the lesson I was
trying to teach her: She was special.
