My Recycled Life — My Mother’s Gift Drawer

“So that’s your mother’s gift drawer,” said a dealer who’d come to my mother’s house to see what furniture, collectibles, jewelry, or art he might want. I was showing him a dresser drawer stuffed with gift-type items still in their original packaging.

It’s not really “my mother’s” gift drawer — it’s where I’ve stashed various scented candles and soaps, crystal knick-knacks, tiny flower vases, toiletries, ceramic figurines, stationery, craft items, and other little gift-store finds that my mother must’ve bought either thinking she’d give to someone someday, or else use herself, but never did. They were squirreled all over the house, and I organized them into a single drawer. 

Right now there are so many news stories circulating about shortages of holiday gifts. If you have a gift drawer, it’ll help you with what gift-giving challenges you may face during this or any season. It may not take care of your entire gift list, but it will take some stress out of the holidays, and take some stress off your budget, too.

Gift drawers aren’t the place for large or expensive gifts, and aren’t intended for every last gift possibility ever — my stock is short on things for men, couples, and children. It’s easy to stock and keep stocked, though. Freebies (those “free gifts”) and extras (two-for-one sales) and bloopers (once you got that irresistible something, you wondered why) that just seem to keep coming our way, they’re good candidates for stocking a gift drawer. Once you’re in the habit of keeping one, it’s easy that when you see something for someone, just buy it, and then put it in the drawer until the right occasion comes around. 

What gifts you receive that aren’t right for you, they may find their way to your gift drawer, too. Be careful, though. If you’re recycling a gift, it better be in perfect condition, useful, preferably not out of its packaging, and it better not get back to the person who gifted it to you in the first place. If it’s some cheap tasteless gag gift, just trash it if you can get away with it, or hide it away if you can’t. 

Neither is a gift drawer a place for things like those family heirlooms you want to “gift” a relative with, only to expect back anytime. My father was expert that way, making a big deal of “gifting” me with, for example, an antique belt buckle, then “borrowing” it back constantly until I told him, just keep it already.

I kept a gift drawer even before I moved into my mother’s house, and so the new one I’ve organized will remain my go-to option when I’m looking for a gift. Every holiday season I go through the drawer and match gifts to recipients, then fill in where needed. It’s a good resource for birthday or anniversary or thank-you or “just because” gifts, too.