When it comes to gifts for our kids, parents, and significant others, being told exactly what they want then turning around and buying it is a pretty straightforward and ordinary transaction. While there’s nothing wrong with it, the experience lacks the charm and novelty of situations where surprise is involved. After all, what’s the point of wrapping a present if there’s really no doubt about what’s inside?

With that said, there are obvious challenges to buying surprise gifts for our closest loved ones. Knowing exactly what to get them and making sure they don’t find out what’s going on are the primary obstacles which one must overcome if they wish to pull off a surprise gift.

Parents/Grandparents

Buying surprise presents for your parents can be a fun experience for the whole family. Kids love the idea of surprising grandma or grandpa with an awesome gift. Most grandparents appreciate and admire the vintage “look,” whether it may be antique and estate jewelry, artwork, or furniture.

Children

Buying a surprise gift for a child is generally not that hard. Parents and grandparents tend to have a good idea of what would make children happy. Siblings can be consulted if you need more ideas. Unless your child is a “peeker” and likes to hunt for presents you’ve bought, you should be able to hide the gift without too much difficulty. It might be a good idea to ask a friend to hide the present at his or her house if your child is a “peeker” or if you simply don’t have room for the gift.

Spouse/Significant Other

Buying a present from your spouse or significant other is more difficult. While we ought to know our significant other well enough to have an idea or two of what to get, the devil is in the details. For instance, a husband could be looking at trendy plus size clothing in search of a great evening dress for his wife but is unaware of her measurements and risks buying an ill-fitting outfit. A wife may want to surprise her husband with a new power tool after remembering him saying the old one finally bit the dust, but doesn’t take into consideration his brand loyalty towards a specific tool company and dislike of others. It takes a little digging to iron out the details of a surprise gift for a significant other.

Successfully pulling off a surprise gift for your significant other is further complicated when couples share shopping and bank accounts online. This system makes it easy for one partner to have a good idea of what the other one is spending money on. Some couples have an agreement that they won’t look at the credit card statements or at the online shopping cart within a certain span of time around a birthday or Christmas. This can be inconvenient, but effective at protecting the surprise.

When you want to hide a gift from your spouse, definitely enlist your children to help keep the secret. They will be excited by all the suspense, and they may be able to misdirect your spouse in creative ways, such as leading them away from the area where the gift may be hidden. They may spill the beans ahead of time, but if they can keep a secret, it’ll be worth the risk.

Not everyone likes surprise parties, but just about everyone enjoys surprise gifts. If it’s a birthday present, they will be especially surprised if you didn’t make a big deal of their birthday beforehand. Don’t make people think that you’ve forgotten their birthday, just play it cool until the big day arrives.

When your spouse, child, parent, or grandparent opens their present, you’ll have the satisfaction of knowing you picked out just the right thing. If you missed the mark, try not to let your feelings be hurt. This is a good situation for keeping the receipt so the gift can be returned if necessary.