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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

Opinions quickly please - Stocking gifts to wrap or not to wrap?

74 replies

DamnBamboo · 22/12/2013 22:19

I can't be arsed quite frankly. Just finished all other wrapping and these will be so small and fiddly.

Is it really bad not to wrap them?

OP posts:

ChatNicknameUnavailable · 22/12/2013 23:33

Nadia - no, nothing from Santa is wrapped. It's in the stocking at the end of the bed, or in a Christmas sack that appears on the sofa.

We do have wrapped presents under the tree too, which are from family...us to the dc, from other family and friends too.

I find it's a nice way to do it...they wake up, go through the stockings. Then we come downstairs and there's the sack that Santa's left with the 'bigger' gifts (stocking is mainly dvds/books/socks/sweets/tat).

Then we'll have a cuppa and some breakfast while the dc look at the stuff santa left for an hour or so. Then we all sit down and open the presents under the tree, which the dc know are the presents that people they know have given to them iyswim?

AndIFeedEmGunpowder · 22/12/2013 23:34

Sorry meant to add

MomOfTwoGirls2 · 22/12/2013 23:35

Wow, never knew people still put satsuma / nuts in stockings. I have heard of it as a tradition, but didn't know it was still alive.

Can't do it for my DDs, they wouldn't eat either...

BigBirthdayGloom · 22/12/2013 23:35

We wrap. Santa uses a different paper for each of the three dc. Started that because it was sweet, but now it really does help get them in the right stocking. He does not wrap the orange or the chocolate coins. Whatever you choose to do will become the tradition and therefore the right thing. Your dc will express indignation that other families do anything else as it will simply be wrong!

makemineapinot · 22/12/2013 23:37

Wrap it all except the £1, satsuma, sprouts (Santa leaves them sprouts instead of a present for every time they've been on the naughty list - kids love it and dd has a whole stalk coming her way on Wed cos of her room!) and chic coins. Means more excitement and anticipation - are they unwrapping pants or something really exciting?!!

BigBirthdayGloom · 22/12/2013 23:37

Oh and our dc put the satsuma straight back in the fruit bowl from whence it came a few hours earlier but would be horrified if it weren't in the stocking!

NadiaWadia · 22/12/2013 23:38

Gunpowder but satsumas are so superior! I think your friends have no taste!

Actually I remember I read something about this a year or so ago. I think it was because clementines are more popular in other European countries, so the Spanish growers can't be bothered with the satsumas just for the Brits. Shame! A clementine in your stocking just isn't the same.

makemineapinot · 22/12/2013 23:38

My 2 don't eat the satsuma - it goes back in the fruit bowl! But it us tradition! First tear I bought nice ones with leaves still attached dd cried cos there were "growths" on her orange!

ChatNicknameUnavailable · 22/12/2013 23:41

Your dc will express indignation that other families do anything else as it will simply be wrong!

I did have one problem last year, just after Xmas. Dc1 (nearly 5 at the time) is very much a 'thinker'. Pretty much nothing gets past him. He came home after visiting his friend for tea one day and was very confused because his friend was insistent that Santa had wrapped all the presents he left him. Dc1 cannot be fobbed off at all, he's like a dog with a bone.

So after a few vague answers which didn't satisfy him and after keeping on questioning, I told him it was probably because he'd been Sooooo good that year that Santa had brought him lots of toys and didn't have time to wrap so many...and that maybe his friend hadn't been left as many, so Santa obviously would have had time to wrap them . It did satisfy him though!

Freddiefrog · 22/12/2013 23:43

gunpowder it was about 4 days after Christmas we exchanged gifts with SiL and given the speed the had that paper off the Santa presents I thought I'd chance it. I didn't think she even noticed the paper, let alone remember it.

haveyourselfashandy · 22/12/2013 23:45

We don't wrap stocking fillers...its mainly sweets and chocolate treats with little pound shop presents.We are quite strict with sweet and chocolate intake the rest of the year so they love it!

shewhowines · 22/12/2013 23:45

Wrap with special FC paper.

I couldn't let kids open any presents, no matter how small, without me watching. I love to see their reactions. Ultra weird, those that allow their kids to open on their own.

Original poster

DamnBamboo · 22/12/2013 23:46

Well I have wrapped the bigger stuff, as big as it gets for a stocking anyway. The way we do stockings is that they bring them into our bed and everybody picks one out at a time, no up-ending here... their choice not mine. So they don't see it all at once anyway.

In answer to the OP who asked if I would like to see my stocking gifts straight away, I never once had a stocking as a child so have no thoughts on it either way, so can't speak from personal experience.

Thanks all

OP posts:

AndIFeedEmGunpowder · 22/12/2013 23:47

Nadia am at no one bothering to grow satsumas for us!

Freddie you clearly had a lucky escape.

Original poster

DamnBamboo · 22/12/2013 23:48

p.s. satsumas way superior to clementines

Also, we have separate paper which is just for the stuff which comes from FC.

OP posts:

AttackOfTheKillerMonsterSnowGo · 22/12/2013 23:48

We wrap, and we wrap F.C's presents and ours in the same paper, but the kids come and CHOOSE the paper with me and we send a roll (diff colour for each child) to F.C. At the beginning of December. That way the kids know which presents are theirs when it comes to giving picking them out from under the tree. :)

Obviously I don't really send a roll, but the kids see me trotting off to the post office with them to post off after I've taken them to school. Cough.

ladypete · 23/12/2013 00:25

Wrap! But don't wrap the chocolate coins or chocolate orange that goes at the bottom

TrucksAndDinosaurs · 23/12/2013 00:45

Wrap otherwise it's just, you know, boring old socks.
Satsumas, choc coins get a pass.

steff13 · 23/12/2013 02:53

We don't wrap.

JeanBodel · 23/12/2013 03:46

We don't wrap. But my kids' stockings are quite narrow - they wouldn't be able to see what's in them because of the shape. They have to put their hands down and root around.

I picked out quite small stockings when they were both pre-verbal and every year I congratulate myself that I don't have to fill two pillowcase-sized stockings with tat.

daisychain01 · 23/12/2013 04:44

Another vote for tissue paper no cellotape

Mia1415 · 23/12/2013 07:44

Definitely wrap! Way more fun

kungfupannda · 23/12/2013 07:47

I never had any of my stocking things wrapped as a child.

DP was horrified when I started shoving unwrapped stuff in DS1's stocking, and insists on wrapping everything.

I leave him to it and drink wine on the sofa.

If he wants it wrapped, then he wraps it!

Seff · 23/12/2013 09:00

DD is 3 1/2 and we've wrapped stocking gifts. Mainly because she wakes at 6am on normal days so who knows what time she'll be awake on Christmas day. At least when they're wrapped it gives us a bit of extra lying in bed time while she unwraps them with us

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