When you have a child who hasn’t made much progress developmentally for many years you will know how hard it is each Christmas and birthday to find new things to buy them. With our other children we go from toys when they are very young to technological gifts, clothes and money but this isn’t always appropriate for our children with special needs.
Regular readers will know how I have spoken about this in the past with James. He does have his favourites and among those are his iPad, puzzles, lotto and matching games and his personalised photo books. He had his first iPad for his 16th birthday. To be honest I never would have thought of it but it was suggested to me by my sister, Joan, who as a special needs teacher had many students who used them. James could, I’m sure, do far more on his iPad than he actually does, he mostly uses it to look at photos of the family and we use it to keep a record for him of all the things he does. He also plays music on it and is particularly fixated with a drag and drop word matching puzzle which he spends a lot of time doing. His puzzles and matching cards are very varied and Joan and I spend many hours searching for new ones that we think James will like. Fortunately, there is a great selection online. He also loves his personalised photo books I make online at Snapfish. I’ve lost count of how many he has now but I usually try and make one for his birthday and Christmas. This year I have made one for Christmas about his summer holiday with us at Hartlands Autism centre on the Isle of Wight.
In thinking about what to buy James this year Joan and I had the idea to ask for inspiration from other parents in a similar situation. I asked my friends and I put a post on Facebook asking people what their son or daughters best present was. This could be ‘best’ simply because their child loves it or because it was something helpful or practical. I had a huge response.
iPads and Beyond
As you might imagine iPads did feature heavily. Shelley and Tim’s son, Luke, enjoys listening to music on his home pod and when he hears a tune on the radio he likes his staff team can find it for him to play on his iPad too. We do that with James too, Shelley 😊.
Louise’s son, Hayden, loves his iPad so much that he carries it around with him even when the battery has run out ! He does also like magnets that you can build things with.
Sara said whilst Adam does love his iPad he also occupies himself with puzzles and games and watches sport or medical emergency programmes. His hearing therapist recommended fidget toys too for when he is feeling stressed or anxious because of his tinnitus and these help to calm him down. I have tried these with James particularly in the car when he is stressed but he’s not at all interested in them.
Whilst Joe likes his iPad his mum, Karen, said his favourite thing is probably his giant Barney. Joe does love Barney a lot. I can vouch for this as I’ve been at Karen’s house when he has been watching Barney on his iPad (with headphones on so everyone else doesn’t have to listen 😉). Joe also likes anything with Pompey Football club on it too.
Nic’s son, Kieran, has had an iPad previously but has also had a Samsung Notebook which they found to be just as good but at less than half the price of an iPad a much cheaper alternative.
Amanda said Jake’s favourite has to be his guitar. He also likes his sloth and buses and trains. I once bought Jake a transport sticker book, kept him amused for hours but I’m not sure where all the stickers ended up. Sorry, Amanda !!
Kylie’s daughter, Kirstie, loves her baby dolls. I know that Kylie and her mum have to look for very specific items requested by Kirstie for her ‘babies’ and Kylie has to have a car big enough to transport all the babies’ paraphernalia. She also loves her toys dogs too though and so Kylie said her best present had probably been her grooming table.
Let’s Get Musical
Like James, a lot of our children get a lot of enjoyment from musical toys. Denise’s daughter, Caroline, favours her percussion instruments and her tongue drum. She also likes books with music CDs, like the Barefoot collection. As well as all that music Caroline likes things to throw like darts, bean bags and marble run. She also has a small trampoline.
Kirsty’s son also adores music in any form. He has all the ‘Singing Hands’ and ‘Shabang’ inclusive learning CDs and DVDs. I know those very well too 😀. He also loves Vtech musical toys, switch adapted toys and the Helpkidzlearn apps on the iPad.
Emma’s daughter also likes switch adapted toys and buzzers to play with.
Oli likes to make a noise according to his mum Liz. He likes to play with a ‘clacker’ like these alligator ones on Amazon.
Chloe’s daughter, Essie, loves her Linkimals by Fisher Price. Emma’s daughter, Amelia, is a big fan of those too.
Personalised Favourites
Personalised photo gifts also came up a few times. Juliet makes her granddaughter a photo book every Christmas and Birthday. I’m right there with you, Juliet. As her granddaughter loves to look at family pictures she gives her key rings with pictures on too.
Sam’s best present ever has been a photo cushion of his favourite Auntie Lynn. His mum Diana says it’s always with him. It sits on Sam’s bed and has to be carried downstairs every morning where it stays in Sam’s day chair until it’s bedtime.
Lesley’s daughter, Emily, also likes to have photo books and keyrings. She has a photo pillowcase and she takes it to hospital and everywhere else she goes. Emily loves her ‘Bilobo’ too.
A Few Alternatives
Andrew, who is 28yrs old, likes to spend a day out or go for a meal with his friends and family. His mum, Janet, explained that they buy restaurant, bowling or Legoland vouchers and go for ‘Andrew dates days.’
Oliver loves his indoor hammock swing which his mum, Lauren, got from Amazon.
David’s son Harvey likes cheap strapped casio watches. Harvey holds the strap and flaps it back and forth. He also likes a waist belt as he feeds it through his hands from one end to the other.
Mary is in sensory heaven with her stretch lizards/snakes and silver foil blankets. Her mum, Jerri, did say they were contemplating getting her an electric drum mat – along with ear plugs for the rest of the family!!
Georgi’s daughter, Isobelle, has a ‘chimeabout.’ She can play with this by herself and get a response from the dangly balls and mirrors. Georgi feels it’s really helped Isobelle with her body awareness. She’s also been enjoying pulling and squeezing a soft ball too.
Having read Georgi’s comments on Facebook, Chloe searched up to see what a chimeabout is and has since decided to buy one for her son Marli as he loves dangly toys.
Finally, Irene’s son, Joshua, tells his mum to write to Santa every year and last year he asked for FIFA 2022. If Santa delivered, I hope Joshua has enjoyed that.
I have really enjoyed everyone sharing their present ideas however large or small. I was aware of most of the items mentioned but not all of them and I am going to look up those I’ve not heard of before. It may give me some new ideas for James. Whether it be a small relatively inexpensive gift or a larger more expensive present we all just want to see our children’s smiles on Christmas Day. Having said that it’s true what they often say that the present we spent our hard-earned cash on gets discarded and the box and paper is sometimes more interesting. In times when we are all finding we don’t have the spare cash we maybe once did, I urge you all to spend wisely. We have often bought collectively for James if a gift is on the more expensive side. I’m sure families will be happy to club together to buy something they especially want rather then lots of small things. We have done this with iPads and James’ photo personalised bedding which was quite expensive.
I hope maybe you’ve got some new ideas from the items above. It was great to see that Chloe was inspired to buy a chimeabout for Marli having read Georgis comments. Like Janet we have sometimes looked at alternatives for James too. Joan once bought him a book about alpacas but his main present with it was to take him on a walking experience with alpaca. Previously she has gifted him some horse-riding sessions too.
If you have any other ideas or gifts that your child has particularly enjoyed we would really like to hear from you.
A big thank you to everyone who contributed and gave permission for me to use their pictures.
