The curse of homemade gifts

[JWBear]

Originally Posted by LSPoorEeyorick

Let me ask you this: would that ugly handmade gift give you a good memory or a laugh in fifty years after your mother has passed away, connecting you to who she was and how she loved you in her own, tasteless kind of way? If you think that, even then, it'll just be an ugly thing you held on to that doesn't help you remember her, then you might consider pitching it.

Or, as the others are cleverly advising, do the swap-out.

I say hold on to it. I received tons of kitschy crafty handmade gifts from my sister over the years. I go rid of most of it as soon as I got it. Now that she is dead, I treasure each and every piece that I still have. Most are stored out in the garage and I would never think of getting rid of them now. They are things made with her own hands that are now irreplaceable.

Anyway, that's my take on it.

[wendybeth]

I agree with JW.

[Alex]

See, you don't need your mom to guilt you into keeping them.

SHE'S GOING TO DIE SOMEDAY!!!! KEEP EVERYTHING!!!!

If that is a motivation, I say* pick one item, throw the rest away and when your mom kicks it you can build a shrine around the one thing.

Or, tell your mom you are throwing away everything you've received from her to date, but that the next item she gives you will be the one item you keep forever and enshrine after she kicks it. So she better put a lot of thought into that next handmade gift. With luck it will be decades before you get anything more than a giftcard to Barnes & Noble from her.

* WARNING: Advise from me on topics of sentimentality is heartfelt but generally considered broken by the larger population. Example: There is no photographic evidence of my first wedding since we never actually got around to buying any of the photos. Example, the second: I do not possess anything that would give evidence that my father ever existed and that doesn't bother me.

[LSPoorEeyorick]

Originally Posted by Alex Stroup

See, you don't need your mom to guilt you into keeping them.

Nobody is guilting her into anything. I brought up bereavement/appreciation because it is a valid point. She might not have thought about that in reference to the situation. Mortality doesn't always creep into perspective until you have lost someone very close to you. (And not everyone is a sneering anti-sentimentalist here.)

Jennie can make her own decisions, but she asked our opinion.

[wendybeth]

It's really very simple: if they mean something to you, or might in the future, keep them. If they don't, don't. If you don't want any more of them, say so.