Does this sound like a bad idea?

[Funghoul]

Last year dp and I had out first child. Dd was around 7m last Christmas and as a small gift from her to her grandparents and great grandparents we had calendars made with her photos. Everyone loved them. She's the first grandchild on both sides of the family and my grandfather acts as though she's the best thing since sliced bread.

The calendars looked lovely but no one apart from my dgf used them because they didn't want to spoil them. They weren't massively expensive, around £25, but we don't have money to really waste on things that won't get used properly.

I was thinking this year, dd could 'draw' a picture and we could stick one of those little calendar books on the bottom. They all love home made cards from her and this way they can still display them but I won't get annoyed at them not using them properly?

calendars are never 'used' by anyone in our family (we all use diaries of various types). Photo calendars are very popular, my parents always use them to show guests (which is better than inflicting a whole album on anyone ) and then cut them down and stick them in album. And it makes them very happy... So I will be doing it again this year!

Not sure that helps!

I always get my parents a calendar every year with pictures of my girls as they love them. They also keep them afterwards for the photos.

Just because you think they are a waste doesn't mean the GPs will. If they love them that's all that matters.

See they have tonnes of photos, and our family do use calendars so I thought combining the two I was onto a winner but obviously not. Thanks anyway, I'm just looking for a token present for them that doesn't cost the earth.

I find this odd. They clearly loved the calendars so it was a great present. Why does it matter to you how they use them? If you don't want to get them again because of cost that it fine, but odd to blame it on their lack of use when they loved them

We do calendars for both sets of grandparents with all their grandkids and we split cost between siblings. It's become a bit of a tradition and the grandparents love them. They don't write on them either but love receiving them. They then keep them a look through them regularly. I used to do them too and didn't write on them, didn't want to make them look messy

Just thought if she drew a picture and we could stick a picture of her on in some sort of nice frame type thing. Thank you I'm thinking on it now.

Did they even hang them up? I could kind of understand if they had them up to look at but didn't want to write on them so they could keep them for ever even though it's not something I would do but odd to just keep them in the cupboard.

If you do want to do a photo thing again, now is the time to be thinking about it as there are lots of offers on (not sure if your £25 was for 1 or all the calendars - seems a lot if it was for just one!). I think snapfish have a 50% off lots of things at the moment ending today (I got the info off the big Christmas bargains thread in the Christmas section and people usually mention when there is a good photo offer on). As an alternative to a calendar, how about a keyring or coaster?

But I think your idea of a picture with little calendar on the bottom sounds great - especially if you tell dd to draw whoever it's for... especially even if it is a big green scribbled lump

I don't think it's odd to want someone to use the present I've bought them but I think maybe I'll buy the calendars and we can make cards.

You understand what I'm saying zipzap. My mum doesn't even hang hers up! That was for all the calendars from aldi so it wasn't a fortune but they could at least hang them!