The Vine: June 3, 2011
Hi Sars! I have a friend in Cobble Hill who just had a baby (yay!). My usual gift to new parents is a gift certificate for take-out food, for a night when they just cannot cope with cooking dinner.
Can you or TN recommend a place that a) is delicious b) delivers c) sells gift certificates that I can purchase remotely, either over the phone or online? I’m from out of town so I can’t even begin to guess what’s good.
The new parents are pretty adventurous eaters, so any type of place is fine, although I don’t know if a new mom would have any particular eating restrictions that would count out certain cuisines.
Auntie Take-Out
Dear Auntie,
Your best bet, I think, is to get them a gift certificate from Delivery.com (I like Seamless Web’s service and selection better, but they don’t currently offer gift certificates — I encourage you to send them an email about that, as I did, so that perhaps they’ll start).
If you browse the available restaurants on Delivery.com and don’t find anything you like, you could also treat them to a cleaning service (we like Great Green Cleaning), or a cloth-diaper service if they’re going that way, although not everyone wants to give the gift of nappies. Heh. I’ve also given new-parent friends gift certificates to an online-personal-assistant company (try timesvr.com or Google “virtual personal assistant services), which they can use any way they like.
Readers?
Tags: Ask The Readers friendships retail
Your takeout GC is a great idea – the less that new parents have to do for themselves while they’re adjusting, the happier everyone is. My family’s preferred new-baby gift is weekly maid service for a month. Every new parent seems to have vacuuming & dust bunny-chasing low on the priority list after sleep, laundry, and eating (in that order), so having someone else around to make sure that the bathroom doesn’t become a biochem lab is a relief.
Slight hijack, though I endorse Sars’s Delivery.com notion–even if they’re not cloth diapering per se, DSQ diapers are often gratefully received by fresh parents.
The word is that, being built to absorb and then be washed, they’re all-around awesome for mopping up the many spills and fluids and leaks involved in Baby Life, and can also be used as light blankets in a pinch. Friend of mine had a kid with persistent diaper rash, and he used these on top of the pretty gifted baby blankets from other people so Rash Kid could crawl around in the nude and air his bottom with some mess protection.
But for the OP, Delivery.com sounds fantastic.
My bad — Seamless Web DOES have gift cards! http://seamlessweb.giftcards.com/shopping/order.html?product_id=5173
(Another reason they’re awesome: Tammy at customer service responded to my “…please?” email in about 10 minutes. Yay SW!)
Do you know if your friends have a washer + dryer in their apartment/building? Because a gift certificate for laundry service could be a life saver.
A friend of mine used a cloth-diaper service and it seemed awesome. I had to help wash my little brother’s cloth diapers and it was nasty, but the service takes care of the washing for you! So if they’re into that, it’s a fantastic idea. (So is the food delivery).
I second the idea that if you can’t find food delivery you like, you could get them some maid service.
Another option (maybe not in this case but for those reading in the future) is an Amazon GC. You can get anything on Amazon – diapers, wipes, clothes, toys, bottle warmers, bottles, pacifiers, teethers, food, whatever. Amazon has a special deal called Amazon Mom (sexist!) where you get a free trial of Prime shipping and can earn additional free months when you buy baby-related stuff. And you can do Subscribe and Save for things you buy frequently (for me: diapers, wipes, fruit pouches) and they just show up at your house automatically. With the discounts and free shipping, it’s cheaper than any brick-and-mortar stores around here. So even if they don’t need diapers and/or bottle-feeding supplies, there are lots of other things. I find I place an Amazon order for baby-related stuff at least once a week because I hear about something useful and can’t get to the store to buy it.
I’m sure there’s something similar in that area, but when I had a baby someone bought me a voucher for a service that delivered pre-cooked meals that you could keep in the freezer and heat up as needed. They also had frozen uncooked meals that you just had to stick in the oven. It wasn’t the best food I’ve ever eaten, but it was certainly better than your standard mass produced Lean Cuisine or whatever and felt healthier than a constant diet of take-away.(The site is here to give you an idea https://www.gourmetdinnerservice.com.au/)
In my neighborhood we have a tradition of taking turns making meals for new mommas/folks dealing with illness or injury. If you have a bunch of friends nearby that can band together, this is an amazing gift. After our 4th was born this February, we had hot homemade meals delivered to our door by friends and loved ones 3 times a week for over a month! It also gives people a chance to see the baby for a few minutes without it being “A VISIT” that the new parents feel they have to prepare for.
Any helpful offering will be most gratefully received. It’s an overwhelming time in anyone’s life–just knowing that you’re trying to make it easier makes the gift that much sweeter.
Just an FYI from the lactation consultant to say that barring any specific cultural constraints, there’s no reason a new mom can’t eat anything she wants! (And maybe you should throw in some soft cheeses and sushi since those have been off-limits for the last 9 months, heh.)
As a new parent, I must compliment you, Auntie Take-Out, on your awesome good taste and consideration for others. If it had not been for my Mom bringing us casseroles, I think we would have lived and died on pizza for the entire first two months, the very thought of which makes me want to cry.
The only other thing that I might advocate is a grocery store gift card for a large chain store that is near them; it’s great to be able to pick up the little things you need after Baby has arrived, but not fret about where the cash is coming from.
@Katherine — Thanks! Happily, all of the babies I know are very well provided for, so buying stuff like clothes or toys seems less helpful than doing something for the strung-out parents. (And I don’t know anything about babies so I can’t volunteer to baby-sit.)
I love Bridget’s idea of a neighborhood cooking roster.
Another idea might be to fork out for a night nurse that can allow the new parents a full night’s sleep.
If that’s too pricey, maybe get a few friends together to pitch in.
The take-out thing is a great idea. My cousin and his wife brought us a pan of lasagna, a bag salad, bread, and a desert (!) shortly after our firt was born. We lived off of that for a week. The super sweet thing – they waited until my mother had left so it when we were on our own. A GC is great because some women have weird eating issues after giving birth due to the hormones and what not. Personally, I had to force myself to eat because I had zero appettite.
While they may seem impersonal, gift cards to major chain stores are a huge help. Especially for the first baby – there are always things that you need that you don’t expect to need. Or you can use the $ for groceries. That can be a big deal if there is a sudden reduction in income due to maternity leave.
Also, gifts of Netflix/Hulu Plus are great – I remember a lot of downtime during the day and those things were a godsend. Since reading is a little hard if you have a baby in your arms (guess whose babies hated the crib) or are expressing milk.
As for the cooking rotation, we have a group within my synagogue that does this sort of thing…deaths, births, illnesses, etc, someone comes along 3 days a week with a hot meal, salad, bread, desert. Before it happened to me, I couldn’t fathom how much it means to just have that dropped off so you don’t even have to think about it.
As far as new mommies, my gift is always to bake some casseroles that heat up nicely at 3 am when you must eat. Lasagna, Shepherd’s Pie, Pot Pie, Soup, etc. You can drop it off before baby is born and it’s there for them.
If Seattle had anything besides Pizza and Chinese to be delivered, I’d be all over the take out gift card thing.