Tag Archives: Gifts

Fishing Gifts and Last-Minute Ideas For People Who Don’t Fish – But Need a Gift Idea

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Selecting a fishing gift for anyone can be a challenging task, but this information will make your decision a little easier this holiday. A great gift will be one that hits close to home and is used, appreciated and enjoyed long it is given. Follow this article and you will have success this season with your fishing gift, even if you know nothing about the sport. The closer the store or organization is to your house, the better the gift will be.

1. Avoid National Stores

To that point, local is everything. Big box fishing stores and major retail stores lack local fishing gear and don’t match local waters. Even if they are close to your house, drive past these for a greater gift. Local stores know local waters. Giant national stores have a central home office and order based on national averages with only slight regional differences. These stores are also influenced by national product manufacturers and advertisers so they will stock anything they are getting great deals on or those products with the most financial support. A gift card to one of these is not the best choice.

2. Fishing Lessons

This might play out in your house. Fishermen leaves on Saturday morning before sun-up. Wakes up the house while getting ready. Some fishermen are back very quickly stating – “they’re not biting”. Lessons will work for them too. In other cases, the fishermen is gone all day long. Fishermen returns at the end of day with no fish, fishing was slow. You think to yourself, that couldn’t have been fun or we never have fish for dinner. I interrupt this paragraph to bring you this (Digression) I know. The running joke up in Door County, Wisconsin is that I have never brought back a fish meal in 20 years fishing there. I keep the myth alive with some catch -and-release these days – shhh don’t tell. It’s a vacation for me so I don’t get up early there and I don’t put that much effort into it. I rather enjoy the ridicule now as tradition there. (Back to the Lessons) For those of you who know anglers who have not returned with fish in years, you can get them some lessons. Local clubs like the Midwest Anglers & Chicago Fishing School offer educational seminars, on-water demos and individual lessons. Hit Google in your area for local clubs and purchase lessons for them. If you are near Chicago, you can purchase fishing lessons at Midwest Angler If you have a club, I encourage you to set up a school and teach fishing!

3. Fishing Club Membership

Not the national fishing club you see on trucks -that is just a bunch of ads – find your local fishing club and purchase your angler a membership or renew for them. In most cases, this is a $20 – $45 annual membership and a gift that will keep on giving! They sometimes have shirts or hats you can purchase along with the membership certificate. Be warned though, these are putzy old men, they might not have a very good “actual certificate” you can hand over as a gift. You might need to get out the computer or get a very nice card and hand make a certificate for presentation’s sake.

4. Local Wise Men Stock the Myrrh

By Wise Men, I am referring to the local bait shop owners. These tackle gurus scratch out a living season to season for a reason. With much smaller shops and no advertising budget, they must stock the good stuff, the items that catch fish. What they lack in space, they make up for in years of stocking their shelves with items requested from their millions of angler-interactions. Your pond close to home is their expertise and the gear on the walls of Roy’s Bait Hut – well, they match those waters perfectly. This can’t be said for the miles of shelves at G Mart or One Fish Pro Shops… Head to your local store and a gift certificate from that place will be gold dust to the angler you are gifting. You might have to Google-it, “tackle shop” followed by your zip code will reward you with the location of your local store. Give them a call regarding gift certificates.

5. No Myrrh? Try Frankincense

Ok, I am getting a little goofy with the headlines. If they don’t sell gift certificates, you need to get creative at your local shop. Go there and ask them to put together a “local pond/river” kit. Tell them your budget and use the local expert to assemble the best selection of products every assembled. While you don’t know a Hula-Popper from Betty Crocker, you will come off looking like a fishing Martha Stewart when you deliver this gift. No one has to know you had help from the local tackle geniuses. The best fishing gifts are found in the bait stores.

6. Tacky Fishing Joke Gifts

This headline has no pun – you’re welcome, but it might be just the gift you were looking for – a funny one. Sure there are online shops with catchy sayings (pun intended) screened on their shirts, mugs, hats. Nothing can match the tacky gifts that can be found at the real mccoy – the Bait Hut, and they know it. You will find some legit unsellable items hidden in the nooks and crannies of these gold mines. If humor is your goal, head to the minnow trough and take a left. Look up on the highest shelves and in the corners for the good stuff. Out-of-date trucker hats with typos, girls & fishing sayings, plaques – pirates don’t have as much treasure as is buried in tiny tackle stores. Keep it to yourself as when you are shopping you don’t want to tick off the purveyor of said store, prior to unearthing your treasure. Some owners – like Joe- at Joke’n Joe’s, for example have no outward sense of humor. The perch might think they’re funny but I’ve only seen him grumpy.

7. Fishing Magazines

In a pinch, a subscription or two to a national magazine can make a nice 12-month gift at a reasonable price. When calling these to order, you might check if they are already a subscriber and either try another magazine or renew their current membership. Great magazines to purchase include: Fishing Facts, In-Fisherman and American Angler.

Fishing Facts has nice articles and tackle reviews and is a great choice if you are on a budget for your gift! It sometimes comes with free tackle too. In-Fisherman will cost a little more but is packed with diagrams and graphic illustrations and is a great choice as well. American Angler is for the fly fisher who wants to study recreating bugs and fooling trout into biting. If the gift you are purchasing is for a fly fishermen, you know them to be a bit odd and into this – this is the way to go. I love fly fishermen – they are all a bit weird in a good way.

8. Super-Emergency Last Minute

Ok, this is where I save your bacon with the last-minute emergency gift. Even if you are a vegan or your religion prohibits eating pork, this will save more of your bacon. If you are a last-minute shopper, I guess I should have put this at the top of the article and not had these goofy intro sentences to slow you down. OK! Menard’s, Lowe’s, Home Depot. Find the nearest that is open late on the way to your gift-giving and there you will find the following: Tool/Tackle Storage, Small Clippers, Warm Hats, Baseball Caps and even fishing-related gifts. Last time I was in Menard’s they had fishing bird-houses, a Christmas (or holiday) village with a bait store, light-up ice fishermen and more. In their paint section they have steel signs that are perfect for the shop, garage or fishing work bench.

When we go fishing, we usually have a favorite place to either pick up the sandwiches or to stop and get a hot meal on the way home. A gift card to one of these places will be a very welcome gift. If you have the energy, skill and ingredients, you can make us cookies, brownies or bars for fishing. Whether on the boat or on shore, home-made treats are always welcome. Someone on a bass show once described fishing 8 hours in a padded bass boat as a “marathon-like” effort. While I think the running might be more of a strain- battling the elements on shore or from boat in Spring & Fall can sap your energy. Your home-made treats might not keep long enough to get us outdoors, so you might need to give a certificate for that which we can redeem later. Then again, there’s always Arby’s.

I hope these gift suggestions help you out with your shopping on any holiday. Do have a very Merry Christmas, Happy Chanukah, Wonderful Kwanza, or just celebrate and have a great New Year!

Perfect Gifts For Babies

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When you are looking for gifts for babies, it can often be difficult to know what to buy because babies aren’t particularly aware of what goes on around them; you will actually get the biggest response from the parents. This is why it is usually best to look at items which will be not just useful for the baby, but must be interesting or entertaining for the parents as well. And by bearing this in mind, it is possible to find a great gift for a baby.

One of the most popular gifts for babies is usually related to the interests of the parents themselves. So if the parents support a particular sporting team, then it can be a fun gift to find a shirt or a baby grow that will carry the logo of that team, which can even be personalized to include the surname of the family.

Similarly, any baby clothing or footwear which can be amended to suit the particular interests of the parents can make for good gifts for babies. These items will be practical for the baby and also be interesting and enjoyed by the parents too.

Another good range of items which people can buy as gifts for babies are the toys which can help bond the parents and the baby together, and especially things which will allow parent and baby to play in harmony can be a particularly good gift which will be enjoyed by both, even if the baby isn’t aware that it is actually a gift.

However, many parents will find that raising a child is an especially expensive and stressful time, so practical gifts for babies can also be especially welcome for parents who are struggling with keeping everything together. Things like baby food, bottles, beakers, nappies, and clothing will always be welcome gifts for the parents although strictly speaking they will still be used for the baby.

It is also very possible for people who are buying gifts for babies to be particularly creative with the presents that they buy. And looking for something that is especially fun or interesting can make for a fun alternative to the more traditional gifts for babies. Items such as soft toys in fun designs can make for particularly good gifts, along with toys that will set a theme for the baby for years to come, whether it be a soft toy version of sporting goods or even toys that will introduce them to other toys later on such as GI Joe or dolls which they can enjoy when they start to grow up.

Ultimately, buying the right gifts for babies will mean considering what they and their parents are like, and how they would respond to the different types of gifts available. By looking at the range of items which can be chosen from, the right gifts may become obvious when looking at the various items available, and thinking about what the parents themselves will enjoy in a gift that is ostensibly for their baby.

Gift Ideas For a Special Mom

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Gifts for mom are items that you want to be meaningful when you hand it to your special mom. What makes it special is the thought behind it, and so you want to make your mom feel she’s well-appreciated and loved. Just like any other ideas, gifts for mom come in different choices as well. There are tons of available option that can be found at local gift stores and online stores. These gifts can presented during mother’s day, her birthday, anniversary and holidays. Giving a good choice of memento can make a great remembrance to commemorate such celebrations. However, the real challenge is how to find a special gift for a special mom? Below are some options you may consider.

Homemade Mother’s Gift

If you are on a tight budget, a homemade mother’s gift can make an affordable option for you. Considering, we live in this time in which it seems like all of our money are easily gone away. But, it doesn’t mean that creating a homemade gift will sacrifice mom’s gift quality. Fortunately, most moms love homemade presents that have a personal touch, so that means you now have one great option to surprise her.

There are dozens of great homemade ideas for mother’s gift, some of them can be difficult to do but there are some that are as easy as artwork. One simple yet meaningful homemade present you can create is a gift mug. You’ll just need to purchase a mug and hand paint them. With the use of paint, you can create various designs that fit into mom’s personality. Another one is a homemade picture frame, just simply buy a plain picture frame that you can decorate with paint, glitter glue, or others that you think can add accent into the frame. Or perhaps a do-it-yourself flower arrangement, this is simple yet can make an appreciative gift for your mom. If you’re good at flower arrangement, you can buy individual flowers and arrange them together according to your desired placement. You can even purchase a plain flower vase, paint and decorate it as well and place the flowers within into your vase. These ideas are quite simple that even a 6 years old child can make these homemade gift for mom.

Personalized Gift

One of the hottest popular gift option today are personalized gifts. These items could be a homemade or store-buy. Personalized gifts are items that are custom-made which a buyer has a freedom to create his or her own personal design on the items. The choices for personalized products are immeasurable, they are available at specialty stores and online stores. Personalized products can be done through embroidering, engraving and even a monogram of your receiver. For mom, personalized gifts you may consider are personalized photo gifts, personalized leather goods such as bags, wallet, organizer, desk clock and more. These are few of personalized gifts idea to give for special mom that doesn’t have to be very expensive, especially if the giver is her young son or daughter. But of course, if he or she is wealthy enough elegant choices are not a problem.