If you happen to be lucky enough to have the perfect boyfriend, sooner or later you're going to want to get him the perfect boyfriend gift.
5 Rules for the Perfect Boyfriend Gift
Follow this quintet of suggestions and you'll reap the rewards of seeing his eyes light up with the joy of a 12-year old boy at Christmas (think of the young chap in A Christmas Story when he gets the air rifle he's always wanted). Perfect boyfriends (and girlfriends, too) love presents, and with a little planning and forethought you can get exactly the right thing that even they didn't know they wanted.
- Make it something for him, not for you.
You may think that the perfect boyfriend gift is something you can share together, something you both like. The odds are, you'd be wrong. There's nothing wrong with those kinds of gifts - in fact, they should be given, and often, between the two of you. However, they are things that nourish you as a couple, not as individuals. The perfect boyfriend gift has to be for him, unreservedly. Make sure when you pick it out, whatever it is, that it is given with the unconditional generosity of a true present.
- Make it have a personal touch.
Remember, this is for your boyfriend. Therefore, you need to put something of yourself into the gift. Maybe that means using your hands to cook a meal that he's talked about his mom making (but make sure to get the recipe). Maybe it's as simple as pouring the bottle of wine that you bought for him, or as complex as the surround-sound system you assembled to surprise him when he came home, playing the mix-CD you made just for him. Whatever it is, you want it to remind him of you.
- Make it something he wants, not something he needs.
Gifts are fun; gifts are spontaneous; gifts are something he would not have bought for himself. This is not the time to get him the electric toothbrush, or the subtle hint of a new ironing board. Instead, get that game you saw him pick up, look at with interest, and then put back in the electronics store when you were both looking for a new toaster oven. The key is to find the thing he would never buy for himself - but really wants.
- Make it something he didn't even know he wanted.
True ninja gift-giving skills come when you take the time to learn enough about your boyfriend to anticipate what he wants before he even knows that what he wants exists in the first place. Let's say your boyfriend likes movies about airplanes - jet airplanes, specifically. Top Gun, even Transformers, he may even have pictures of the Blue Angels on his desktop. A good gift might be a flight simulator game, or maybe even an RC controlled airplane. But a perfect gift would be more along the lines of a flight in an airplane, maybe even buying him a lesson in the cockpit at the local airport.
- Make it irreplaceable.
The perfect gift is one-of-a-kind; even if it's something store-bought, like the above mentioned surround-sound system, the fact that it was put together by you, playing the music you picked out for him, makes every other stereo system for the rest of his life pale in comparison. Even if he went on to become a commercial pilot, that first moment in the cockpit because of you means it will always be special. This doesn't mean that there aren't many gifts you can give later; each of them can be perfect, too.
Beware! Giving the perfect boyfriend gift means you are liable to be the object of some perfect girlfriend gifts, as well. If not...then it might be time to rethink the "perfect boyfriend" idea, don't you think?
