Uneven amount of gifts! Help me

[Statsquestion1]

I’ve gone and done it again…dd12 has 30 gifts and ds10 has 23 😅

I need to balance it out. (and no, I don’t want to take away seven of hers)

so far I’ve thought of
a rubix cube
a plain chocolate orange( I had an order age one but forgot he doesn’t like orange flavour!)
a fidget toy of some sort

hit me with ideas please…nothing too big and no major tat. I like useful gifts.

I'm not criticising but I would have omitted the 2 mascara as 12 is a little young for make up.

I'm really lucky with my children and grandchildren, one lot had spending money for their holidays, one has a magazine subscription and the other 2 have thir warhammer paint collection enhanced.

She is nearly 13. She wears clear mascara daily. I don’t think it’s a bad thing. She just started secondary school in September and all her friends do the same so it’s the norm for her age group of 12/13 “just started secondary” group. I was the same.

It’s so sad that they start with the make up nonsense earlier and earlier. At 12 she may not even have started with periods and already they are told their natural face is not good enough.

By 16 they’ll have had their eyebrows micro bladed and the pouty filled lips with the hideous lipliner, massive fake eyelashes, silly long acrylic nail, bronzer all over and job done they’ve become one of the many.

@Statsquestion1 how can she be nearly 13 if she started secondary school in September. Children turn 12 in Yr 7.

My dd's 27 and still doesn't wear make-up to school . Neither do her Y8's. There would be letters home and detentions.

Well not everyone on here is based in the uk…and her school doesn’t focus on that kind of stuff. And a little bit of mascara never hurt anyone…you insinuate like your dd is and her year 8s are somehow better for it, everyone is different and just because my daughter was a bit of mascara doesn’t mean it’s gonna lead her down a path of delinquency.
Appearance choices are not always the same as character development!
I wore mascara and purple eyeshadow at age 12 and I’ve also been to university and hold 2 degrees and a masters.

Yeah she got her period a year ago…

What an outstanding user name you have!

You.. you.. don't do stockings???!! OMG, that's almost as bad as no sprouts!!!!

How about Toblerone?

@FrodisCapering

No, I wasn’t brought up with them either. So I don’t so them. Don’t worry we have sprouts though…and yes to a toblerone.

Is 30 presents a standard thing in English speaking countries?

What fresh hell is this? Please, please don’t make ‘number of presents’ any kind of thing in your family. Even value of presents can vary according to the stage of life a child is at.

Op I'd wrap some of hers together so they end up with the same number of things to open.

I get it. Its important to me my kids have the same number of gifts to unwrap. Except this year the oldest wants something big and £££. So I feel like its impossible. I've still spent less on my youngest but he'll end up with more to unwrap.
That said oldest might end up unwrapping pants n socks.

So do your children actually count them to make sure they have the same?

They start secondary at 13 here in Ireland

No…I do…they don’t care. But as I said…I do!

My DD’s have different amounts and different amounts spent. They are older now and one has a part time job, she hasn’t asked for much where as youngest has SEN’s and gets through loads of clothes, shoes, slime/putty and Lego so she’s easy to buy for.

In the past I have tried to keep it equal and have bought dd1 things like….

Giant tube/box of Jaffa cakes from B&M
A fluffy blanket or oodie
PJ’s
Funky socks
Underwear
Pringles (the big tube/box)
Kinder selection box

Dd1 never really wants much, her hobbies have always been gaming and photography but I can’t afford those things and she now buys them herself. It’s only really worth buying things you know they will love or use.

You could also put some gift cards into a box/gift bag? Dd always appreciates a Gregs or Costa gift card.

In our house it’s not that they count them, neither of my kids was ever bratty like that and we wouldn’t have stood for it. It’s more that we tended to hand everyone something to open at the same time (because we’re all ND, so the MN thing of everyone honing in on one person opening a gift doesn’t work for us). So if the numbers for the kids aren’t at least roughly even, it would end up with one being finished while the other still had presents under the tree.

Wrap each slipper separately - that’ll get you down by 2…..