I am fortunate enough to know the parents of lots of babies about to be born in the next few months. Several of them have heard about my blog at this point, and I’ve received a couple of requests for gift registry advice. Of course I have an opinion or two to offer on the subject.
One of the most important things to remember is: Register where people shop – Target, Walmart, or Toys-R-Us (Babies-R-Us are almost always located inside Toys-R-Us stores nowadays). Choosing major national chain stores is also important for your out-of-town family and friends. Believe me – everyone wants to buy your baby presents and making it easy gets your baby more stuff. If you register at obscure regional department stores or little boutique shops, you eliminate a good many potential gifts, and you end up getting stuff you don’t really want. In addition, registering at major on-line shops like Amazon.com or Diapers.com can be a good idea if the majority of your family and friends don’t live anywhere near you. In addition, when you want to modify the registry for major chain stores, you can do so on their websites without having to physically go into the store. I do recommend setting up the registry in person, as you get a cool laser gun to walk around the store shooting bar codes – new daddies love that.
Scenario – You live in Arizona because you relocated there for work. Your friends and family didn’t relocate with you of course, and because you and your spouse had little to do, and not too many new friends, you spent a lot of your time alone and having sex, and surprise – you ended up expecting a baby. Your best friend decides to throw you a baby shower because you have NOTHING and that’s what the BFF is supposed to do. Instead of everyone coming to your little patch of sand in Arizona, you and your spouse decide to head to Los Angeles where everyone lives so that more people have an opportunity to attend. More people = more gifts. Let’s face it, people love you, and want to see you, but the majority don’t want to visit you in Arizona AND buy you a gift. Well, wouldn’t it be nice for those friends and family to have an on-line resource to purchase gifts for you that could be shipped directly to you in Arizona? Let’s assume you are well-liked and 100 people show up for your party – how are you going to get 100 diaper disposal units back to the farmstead? The answer – Amazon.com or gift cards to major national department stores.
So, you’ve picked a store to register, or two, or three, now what do you register for? Well baby stuff, but not all baby stuff. How generous are your family and friends? Did someone already offer to buy you furniture? What are the odds that if nobody offered already, that you could register for a baby nursery bedroom set, and your friends or family members are going to fulfill that request for you? Not too good? At best, your parents might have offered to buy the crib, but for most people the rest of the furniture is up to you. I’m not saying you shouldn’t register for it; just don’t get your hopes up. What I’m telling you to do is to register for things people are actually going to buy you. People register for some of the most useless crap – see previous rant about wipe warmers – and the useful stuff gets ignored. Don’t make this mistake.
If there is one rule I want you to follow when you are registering is this: register for things that you would buy for your baby, even if nobody is willing to purchase it for you. For instance, cribs do not come with mattresses (this was a surprise to me). There are 25 or more different models of crib mattress available to parents. Which one do you register for? If you are thinking, “if I have to buy it, I’m getting the $40 foam mattress, but since I’m hoping that Aunt Millie is going to send it to me, I’m going to register for the $300 orthopedic spring mattress made out of organic cotton” you are not going to get too many gifts, and your baby is going to end up on the $40 foam mattress anyway. Give Aunt Millie the opportunity to purchase the $40 mattress, and 10 other items on your registry instead of blowing the whole $300 on one item.
You will be sorely disappointed if you register for overpriced baby stuff, hoping that someone will spring for it. I made that mistake with our car seat. I registered for a car seat that retails for $350. Nobody bought it for me. When my daughter grew out of the infant car seat, I ended up purchasing a $60 Graco seat (for $35 on clearance). While I wanted the more expensive one, and it looked nicer, the $60 car seat turned out to be rated equally safe by Consumer Reports. If I had registered for the one I ended up buying in the first place, I might have received it as a gift.
A valuable bit of advice is to not be afraid to add a little line on your baby shower invitations (or have your BFF add the line): ______ is registered at Target and Babies-R-Us. Gift cards and gift receipts are appreciated. So no matter what you get, registry or not, you can return it for what you want.
And finally, this is very important, read it carefully: DO NOT REGISTER FOR CLOTHS. Why not? Have you ever tried to find an article of clothing in a department store, from a gift registry? Try it. You will understand what I mean. Plus, you are going to get cloths as gifts even if you don’t register for them. This is the item that people use to round off the purchase they are making for you. Let’s say that one of your guests wants to buy you a humidifier that costs $35, but they budgeted $50 for your gift; the automatic reaction is to add a cute (or ugly) outfit to the gift or a handful of bibs to make up the $15 difference. Trust me on this – don’t register for cloths.
