"The Best Birthday Idea Ever" (direct quote from birthday girl)

Only one more reason that you all should want to be my best and closest friend. My roommate has brought to my attention that I am a gifter. That is my love language (I'll get into that more in another post). I don't think I was always this way. I would usually go for the easiest and most convenient thing. For a girl: lotion, candles and other silly girly stuff that she will only get a dozen other gifts just like it. For a boy: most likely a giftcard, I don't buy for boys all that often.

But then one day it happened. The joy of getting someone the perfect gift. Something that you know they will love and is completely perfect for them. This happened probably three or four years ago. It was my oldest friend Julia's birthday coming up and I had just gotten big into buying online. There it was. The most perfect gift I could give her. Something that had nostalgia for our childhood yet she would still enjoy even as a grownup. Faerie Tale Theatre's adaptation of Cinderella. Oh it is the best. It has an extremely young Matthew Broderick playing the prince with a slightly effeminant nature. Hilarious. So of course she loved it and I felt so proud of myself for actually thinking of the person I was getting the gift for.

Now I don't always have these Ahah! moments of figuring out the perfect gift. It depends on how close I am to the person and how much time I spend with them. For Julia that is probably the only perfect gift she will ever get me if not the last gift she ever gets since we are no longer in touch. But for my roommate L, I have had two good years of getting her the perfect gift. What makes something the perfect gift is that it will be so unexpected by the receiver but also loved as well.

L will make off handed comments about things she wants. Things that I know she really wants but then tends to forget about them and doesn't buy them for herself. Last year was a c.d. that was semi-hard to come by. This year was a bike. Not just any bike, but a Beach Cruiser. L had seen them on sale at Sam's Club in the winter and thought about buying one to save on gas and such. She never did buy it, though she casually mentioned it from time to time of something she would do. So I thought her and sister and I could go in on it together. Unfortunately all the bikes at Sam's Club were sold out. One might think I would have let it go at that but no, not when the perfect gift is staring me in the face (also, I had no other idea of what to get her) So I searched online at all the usual sites for a bike but the prices were too high for just two people. Well so I thought about including other people. It took seven people contributing different amounts to make up the difference. We got it shipped to the sister's house and this all happend about a month before the actual birthday. Man it was so hard to keep it a secret and I was excited to give it to her. She did know that it was expensive enough for lots of people to go into. There were times when I thought she might have an idea of what it was and I was worried that I had messed up the suprise. Well, we had someone put the bike together and hid it in the garage the day of the party until the final reveal.

Well, she loved it. Of course she did or else it wouldn't have been the perfect gift. She was totally surprised. (warning: blowing of my own horn a bit to follow) Even though others went into the buying of it. Nobody put as much effort or much thought into the idea and acquiring or felt as much stress. I was so happy when it was over.


Man, now what I am going to give her next year! How will I ever top this? I'll just have to keep my ears open.