If you're a stepparent - who chooses / pays for DSC Christmas presents?

[squicketysquack]

I guess there are a few options:

1. DP/H chooses and pays for all DSC presents
2. SM helps to choose / contributes towards a joint present for DSC
3. DP/H and SM buy separate presents for DSC

In our case it’s 1) – DP chooses / buys for his ‘side’ of the family, including SS, I do for mine. Mainly because we have separate finances I guess. Just interested in what others do really and what the reasons are.

The money for both DS(1) and DSS(8)'s presents comes from family money, but that is made up mainly of his earnings as I don't work many hours because of DS.

I choose both boys' presents though, because he is shit about Christmas. The last time he chose his presents he left it until last minute and then went out and bought him all the things he wanted him to play with, rather than what he would actually want IYSWIM.

I chose/buy/wrap almost 90% for dSC and our DC. DH will occasionally come up with a specific idea for one child or the other and does choose most of the books (we do mostly book stockings). Mostly I think it's because I'm home more with more time. I think I buy far more for them than if DH was in charge.

Complicated here.

We only have dss, I don't have children. Dp and I earn a similar amount, though he probably has less disposable income as he pays maintenance and the mortgage (I bought my half of the house outright so don't pay it).

I take breaks from work though, so over the year our earnings and disposable income probably even out.

We have a joint account for bills, holidays, household maints, groceries. NOT gifts.

In theory he buys all the gifts for his family (which is bigger than mine - he has six adults and three children to buy for) and I buy for mine (two adults, two adult offspring). Same re friends if we buy for them.

In reality he leaves it too late, doesn't know what to buy, I end up doing it and his sisters comment on how much better their presents are since he met me. And I don't always remember to get the money back from him.

And some things get thrown in with the grocery shopping so get paid for joint.

Dss - used to be that we bought separate. But once we lived together we decided they would all be from both of us and we buy sort of half each - though what happens really is that I buy all the small presents, stocking fillers, sweets etc, and dp buys One Big Thing (last year a Kindle Fire). So we do a sort of reckoning after Christmas. Last year he owed me money and we agreed he'd give me £100 which was for all the presents I bought.

Last year I wasn't working at Christmas really - I had stopped to do my final law exam in Sept, then did some consultancy in Oct/Nov and by Dec was looking for a new assignment (which I started on 20th Jan) - so I felt slightly concerned that I was spending so much.

This year I will be working, albeit I have 13 non-working days in Dec so will be pretty low on pay, but am in work until end March anyway so no need to be concerned. So even if I do spend more, I'll probably not ask him to pay me back.

Plus we're going away to Scotland for Christmas with my family - we have to pay c£500 towards the house, so we're reducing gifts to make up for that, and we won't be able to pack too much into the car.

My DP will come pick presents with me for my dd and the money will come from our joint account. But she's been in his life since she was 3 (now 6) and he treats her like his own.

Ex-h and his gf tend to buy dd separate presents (ie ex-h buys some from him and gf buys something from her.). I find that a little strange since they live together but whatever works for them and my dd doesn't object to the extra presents!!

OP here...sorry it's taken me a while to come back! Sounds like you all do far more than I do re presents for your DSC. My DP sounds similar to a lot of yours...will leave things til very close to the time and then be a bit panicky about what to buy and getting things sent in time, whereas I am mostly organised pretty well in advance, presents planned and bought for 'my' side weeks before Christmas. DP has absolutely no expectation that I will sort out presents for his family or SS btw, he expects to and is more than happy to do it himself, it's just his 'way' is different to mine I guess!

The first Christmas we were together I put loads of effort into gifts for SS, did a stocking with small gifts and chocolate etc even though he wasn't with us over Christmas itself, but then I realised the following year that what that basically meant was that DP didn't really have to make much effort, which I felt as the actual parent, he should. He said he genuinely thought I enjoyed doing it which was why he'd left it to me the previous year, I said that actually I didn't enjoy it, I hate shopping as much as he does, so it's back to him doing it and SS not getting much in the way of little bits and pieces as DP just concentrates on one or two big presents.

Which brings me back to my reason for asking I guess....I know that if I took more interest in thinking up / sourcing / buying presents for SS, DP would be really grateful, and SS would get more stuff.

But I feel like I have enough to think about / pay for with my own family. DP would never sort out my dad's present for example, or my nieces, or buy them extra things over and above what I have bought them, so why should I do it for SS? Just because I'm female and 'better' at these things?! Because I'm the SM and I should want to? I don't know....

We do option 2 all household purchases inc gifts are halved.

Oh but I don't go halfs on shoes and stuff for his DC and he doesn't with my DC thats between ourselves and our ex partners .

All our money is joint money. I do all the choosing and shopping for dsd.

Specialsnowflake I think that's fine. Things like shoes for your DSC's should be their parents' responsibility to sort, whilst you sort your own children out.

We both save 40 a month. I do all the shopping and i love it

My dad would ask us what we wanted and was generous so we used to get great presents from him, records (this was a long time ago!), games etc. Then he got married and his wife took over for some reason and she didn't know us very well so would buy things which were a bit childish or stereotypically girly. It hurt - felt like he couldn't be bothered to make any effort now there was a some random woman who knew nothing about us to do it for him. Looking back, I can see she had good intentions but I still think he was lazy and thoughtless.

DP and his Exw his exw decide what their main present will be and DP buys it. I pick up bits and pieces as I'm doing the Christmas shopping for them to open at our house, so does he so I guess it's mostly him and a little me

Depends on age really..we buy our own presents and SD buys his own. The amount spent is the same on my DS as my DD whom I have with my DH. Depending on whoever has money at the time spends it. This might alter and would expect it to when DS older and into person gadgets such as phones,laptop etc which he would use at both houses.

DH chooses the main ones for DSS and DSD as he knows their preferences better, and I pick something smaller that is just from me. All of it is paid from our joint account, we don't split finances in any way, though I'm the main breadwinner and DH is a sahd. His ex doesn't see them or provide maintenance so we pool all finances and spend on all dc equally.

I contribute and DP pays for the majority. DSS chooses what he wants (he's 6) and generally gets everything he asks for (he's quite sensible about what he asks for) and we buy him a few little surprises which we choose together. He believes in Santa and the way my DP does it is that all presents come from Santa aside from presents from his uncle/grandad.