Written by Megan Mullaly
In The Vindi’s Holiday Gift Guide, we’ll walk you through perfect gifts for everyone on your list!
As the holiday season approaches, you may be experiencing the stress that accompanies gift giving which may be especially difficult this year. Because you can’t shop around at the mall or make a quick pit stop at the store, it’ll be more difficult to navigate holiday shopping than usual. While this holiday season will look a little different than we’re used to, it’s still a great time to show your love and appreciation for friends and family. In order to ease the stress of holiday gift giving, we’ve created the following gift guide to aid your holiday shopping!
For Stress Relief
For those on your list that could use some stress relief, a weighted blanket or heated back massager is a great gift.
Weighted blankets offer a number of incredible benefits that help ease stress. Because they keep a person’s body from fidgeting throughout the night, weighted blankets improve sleep, leading to decreased anxiety. The average price is $66, but they can cost anywhere between $20 and $200.
Another great stress-relieving gift is a heated back massager. These back massagers relieve back pain with both heat and kneading. Heated back massagers may be incredibly helpful this holiday season, as we may sit in front of a screen more often than previous years. The average price for a massager is $40, but the price can vary from $10 to $60, depending on the variety of settings.
For Life Online
Because many of us have had to learn how to adapt to online schooling or work, you can’t go wrong giving gifts that make life online a little more bearable.
A great gift for those that spend a large part of their day online is a pair of blue-light glasses. These glasses have lenses that block or absorb the harmful blue light that is emitted from a computer or phone screen. Blue light strains the eyes and activates the brain, making falling asleep more difficult. A pair of blue-light glasses can be found at almost any price, but you can expect to pay around $30 for a quality pair.
Rocketbook smart notebooks are also a great gift for those who do a lot of work online. These notebooks have the look and feel of paper, but can be wiped clean and reused. Before being wiped clean, send your notes to the Cloud to transfer them into digital materials. These notebooks can be purchased from anywhere between $20 and $30.
For Book Lovers
If there’s someone on your list that always has their nose in a book, consider giving them a book by their favorite author or a One Line a Day Journal.
When you have a book lover on your list, you can never go wrong in giving them a book by their favorite author or a book in a genre they enjoy. A great way to find books to gift is by looking at the listing of their favorite book on Amazon and looking through the related searches, as these books will be similar.
Another great gift for book lovers is a One Line a Day Journal. These books consist of five years’ worth of journal entries with a few lines each day. The idea is to write a few lines daily; and at the end, you have five years’ worth of memories. When the One Line a Day Journal is completed, it serves as a book recounting the last five years of an author’s life. These journals cost a little less than $15.
For Cinema Lovers
When you have a cinema lover on your list, a great gift is an article of clothing referencing their favorite show, movie or a subscription to a streaming service.
If a person is passionate about a show or movie, you can never go wrong in getting them a sweater that references that. For example, if you have a friend that loves “The Office,” you could give them a Dunder Mifflin Paper Company T-shirt or a Schrute Farms sweater.
Another great gift for the cinema lover in your life is a subscription to a streaming service. A variety of streaming services offer incredible content, and by gifting your cinema lover a subscription, you are gifting them endless hours of entertainment! Two of the best streaming services are Netflix and Hulu, which both cost approximately $10 per month.
For Travelers
Great gifts for someone in your life that loves to travel include a scratch-off map or a portable charger.
Scratch-off maps allow the traveler in your life to document their trips and visualize all the places they have been. You can find many options, such as different color palettes for your desired aesthetic in both United States and world maps. These maps can cost anywhere from $10 to $50, depending on size and quality.
Another great gift for a traveler is a portable phone charger. When you're travelling, having your phone at all times is vital because phones offer maps, translation apps, and methods of photographing your trips. Portable chargers can cost between $5 and $50, with the higher end offering a longer lasting charge.
For Outdoor Lovers
Because the holiday season can be cold and gloomy, a succulent kit or sunlamp are great gifts for a lover of the outdoors.
Succulent kits allow a person to plant and grow their own succulent. This brings the element of nature into their home, which is incredibly helpful in the wintertime. Succulents alone can cost as little as a couple dollars and succulent kits can cost between $20 and $50.
Another great gift for the nature enthusiast in your life is a sunlamp. One of the great things about being outdoors is the exposure to sunlight. Because the wintertime offers so little sunlight, you can’t go wrong gifting your nature-loving friend a sunlamp. These lamps cost between $30 and $80.
For Skincare Gurus
Great gifts for the skincare guru in your life is Glossier’s The Skin Care Edit bundle or a product organizer.
Glossier is one of the frontrunners in the skincare market. Their Skin Care Edit bundle is a collection of their best-selling skincare products, including their iconic Milky Jelly Cleanser and Balm Dotcom. This kit is perfect for anyone with a passion for skincare, and retails at $50.
Another great gift for a skincare guru is a makeup organizer. These organizers offer a great way to keep skincare products easily accessible. Makeup organizers can cost anywhere between $10 and $50 depending on the size and style.
Shopping Small
While online shopping is a great way to avoid a trip to the store, local businesses also offer great gifts, and shopping local gives back to the community.
A great Cleveland-based company to purchase gifts from is Cleveland Candle Company. They offer a range of scents in the form of candles, wax melts, and bath and body products. Their products can be purchased online or at one of their stores in Mentor, Coventry or Ohio City. Another great option from the Cleveland Candle Company is a gift card so your friend can stop in the shop and create their own candle. They get to pick their jar and the scents they’d like to mix into their candle. The price ranges between $16 and $36, depending on the size of the jar chosen.
Another great gift for the creatives on your list is a gift card to Maggie and Ellie’s. A pottery and art studio in Strongsville, they offer board art, pottery and canvas painting, and glass fusing. You could even create a custom piece at their studio to give someone on your list.
If you’ve racked your brain and are unsure what to give that last person on your list, you can’t go wrong with a gift card tree featuring gift cards to popular Cleveland hotspots. With gift cards to places such as Mitchell’s Homemade Ice Cream, Barrio Tacos, Campbell’s Sweets Factory, and The Chocolate Bar, this gift is bound to be a hit.
While this holiday season may be more stressful than usual, don’t pass up the opportunity to show your appreciation for friends and family!