Do Holiday Wish Lists Take the Spirit Out of Gift Giving?

Kids should advocate for themselves during the holidays (and always) but are they missing the reason for the season when they get everything they want?

The holidays are upon us and in my Jewish and Christian home, December tends to be a free flow of gifts for my 9-year-old and 4-year-old. That said, I try to raise assertive but appreciative multiracial Black children so I’ve always completely resisted the idea of wish lists. I usually tell people to surprise the kids. I’ve noticed, though, that that approach is a bit hit or miss. Sometimes, my kids fall in love with the presents and, at other times, the poor toys are forgotten by the end of the day. So, this year, we decided to give holiday wishlists a try. I spoke to other Black parents about how they’re dealing with this month of excess to assuage my mixed feelings. Here are some lessons I’m taking with me.

Identifying their needs and desires is an important skill to develop, especially for Black kids.

In pursuit of raising free Black children who can identify their needs in the face of a society that seeks to tell them that they don’t deserve the same as white kids, wishlists can be a powerful lesson in getting in touch with one’s true desires and learning how to ask for it. “I strongly believe that children should be empowered to ask for what they want and believe they are deserving of receiving it,” Chanelle James, a New Jersey parent, noted about her 8-year-old son. In this spirit, she often shares the list with family members. “I’ve never liked assuming that I would automatically know what he likes just because I am his parent. Always better to ask. We send the list to our immediate village (grandparents, uncles, and aunts). I think it’s better that my son gets things he’ll actually want versus things that he’ll never play with.”

Consumerism is raging all around our kids. Mindfulness is the key to good gift-giving.

Every kid loves a thoughtful present but there is a balance between excess and mindful gift-giving that can bring a spark of joy to a kid’s life. “I am a bit ambivalent towards holiday wishlists as I am living in a period of extreme consumerism and the advent of ad campaigns to lure kids into pressuring their parents to buy buy buy. I have grown to detest that,” Dane Peters, a Trinbagonian parent from New York, shared with me. “At the same time, it takes me back to my childhood of the joy I felt when I woke on Christmas morning to parang, homemade bread, and Milo. You think about the presents.” He notes that he wants his 9-year-old to know that “this period is not only about what you can get, [but] demonstrat[ing] kindness, love, and care without condition.”

Assertiveness can be a powerful lesson for Black girls.

Teaching Black girls to discard the myth of the angry Black girl and be as assertive as they want is key to raising strong Black women. In schools, Black girls are often invisibilized or hyper-visible for all the wrong reasons. At home, we parents need to help our children practice asking for what they want.

“As a Black woman in America, I am amazed at how easily many White children can know what they want and unapologetically ask for it. I do think that sometimes there is a slippery slope into self-indulgence, but with conscious parenting, it can instead slip into radical self-love,”  Sarah Harris, a Utah mom to two kids ages 8 and 13 states. “This is a muscle that I am growing at 43 years old and I encourage my Black daughters to have wish lists because I want them to pause, tune into their bodies, and ask themselves "What do I want?" …It does not mean that you will get it. Sometimes, the healing and the growth comes in just being able to ask for what you want.”

It’s okay for you to re-envision the whole idea!

“I never made them and I don't know if my daughter knows they exist,” Imani Chapman, a New Yorker, said of her 10-year-old child. “What we started when she was very young was an ongoing photo album. When we are out and she sees something she likes, she takes a photo and I put it in a "Gifts for A" album on my phone. A couple of times a year, I review it with her to see if the items are still wanted. Then when/if people ask or when I prepare to gift her something, I go to the album.” Chapman also doesn’t send out this album to her family, unless requested. She also wants her daughter to learn that giving and receiving are paired together.

Your kids can view wishlists as possibilities instead of guarantees.

Parents who do wishlists can help their kids think through what they’d like while realizing they’re not going to get everything on their list. “My kids get very excited to make wishlists knowing that the items on there are possibilities and are not guaranteed,” Antonevia Ocho-Coultes says about her 8- and 11-year-old boys. “It allows them to choose only things they would truly like to receive because they don't know what on their list will be fulfilled.” She wants her kids to leave the holidays with three lessons: “The value of what they have and how truly little they need, thinking of others in such a way that their gifts to others demonstrate thoughtfulness and care, and that the season of giving is also an exercise in gratitude.”

For many Black families, joy is in the act of giving.

Especially with older generations, shopping for a gift for a loved one is an act of love and care. I asked Agatha Skerritt-Burke, a Florida mama to 10 and 12-year-old kids, if she sends wishlists to her family and she stressed, “No - to my mum. Because while I have sent a list to her in the past (as I did with all the grandparents) my mum has made it clear that she "doesn't want me telling her what to get her grandkids." Skerritt-Burke also wants her kids to “learn that the size, number or price tag of these gifts are not an indication of how much a person cares for and loves them.”

Often Black kids are encouraged to shrink who they are to fit into society’s biased pigeonholes. The key to balancing excessive consumerism with mindful gift-receiving for Black kids lies in the conversations and prep work parents do with them to get them ready for the holiday season. With some intention and a touch of love and grace for our older folks, gift-giving and receiving can hold precious moments of joy, community, and appreciation that our kids are bound to remember for a lifetime.

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