A diary/planner

Thanks grandma, but you’re nowhere near organised enough to plan your entire year in a little book. If you need to remember a date, you just put it in the notes section in your phone and hope you’ll look at it at some point in the future. Risky, I know, but there’s 150% more of a chance that you’ll look at your phone than in a little diary that’ll likely fall down the side of your bed within a week.

Pyjamas

When your mum knows full well you either snuggle up in your onesie or go full-on commando when it comes to going to bed, you’re not entirely sure why this present crops up once a year. Cute as pyjamas are, you’ve outgrown them now (and you’re on to the more mature, sophisticated look of an oversized t-shirt or simply nothing at all). Onesies are an exception as they feel like being permanently hugged by a teddy bear. But pyjamas? They’ll probably end up stuffed in the bottom drawer with the rest of them. Sorry mum.

A selection box

This may have once been one of the most exciting presents in the pile for you as a child, but now that you can go out and buy a Cadbury’s bar whenever you please, the excitement of receiving a pitiful selection of only four or five chocolates has been well and truly lost. But there’s always that one lazy family member who goes out and buys a hoard of them when they’re on offer to be distributed out amongst family and friends.

Socks/underwear 

What would your top drawer look like without a little Christmas contribution every year? As much as socks and underwear are usually a complete let-down to unwrap, these really are essentials that slowly decrease in number over the year. Pointless as a gift of the two seems, without your parents’ consistent yearly buying of them, you’d have to bother to spend your own money getting some- which feels even more pointless.

A gift voucher

You’re not going to lie; these are probably your most favourite gift when it comes to those given by relatives you don’t actually ever see in person. Don’t know what to get for your god-daughter? Get her a gift card. Struggling to think what your second cousin removed even looks like, let alone what they want for Christmas? Get him a gift card. There’s nothing more satisfying than picking up a card and feeling the bulk of a little extra in there. Still, money would be better.

Something for a ten-year-old

We all have that aunt/granny/friend of a parent who’s convinced we’re still children, despite their regular visits (where the line of greeting is always ‘oh, haven’t you grown!’) and being present at our milestone birthdays. It’s because of them that every Christmas you’re always left with a colouring set, a cuddly toy or a pencil case that you’re completely unsure where to put. Too cheap to sell on eBay: check. Too guilty to immediately throw away: check. Said item normally ends up under your bed or in the bottom drawer of your wardrobe until you throw it away in a future clear out.

Deodorant

Because apparently it’s acceptable to give out toiletry essentials as gifts these days. This may seem like your parents’ way of telling you that you smell (and every so often that is in fact true), but most just can’t think of any more present ideas and add the deodorant to up the numbers. And when it saves you from having to buy some yourself, you’re not complaining.

A Christmas-themed item of clothing that you now can’t wear until next December

For most people, though you may deny it, Christmas is over from the moment you’ve opened your last present. So why at least one friend or family member presumes you’ll appreciate a woolly Christmas jumper, a pair of reindeer bed socks or some homer-Simpson-as-Santa boxers is beyond you. Unless you’re that obsessed with Christmas that you need a yearly reminder that it exists- or you’re just totally not bothered- those Christmas items will be stuffed in the bottom of your wardrobe before you can say ‘happy holidays’. And come next December, you’ll have probably completely forgotten about their existence, and will only find them when in the task of stashing away yet more Christmas items.

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