Besides your foot. 
For those of you who make up stockings for Christmas, or for those who receive a stocking each Christmas, what goes into it?
My parents used to make me one every year when I was still living near them. Along with my favourite candy, they’d usually fill it with little sample sized packs of things - shaving cream, powders, shampoos, etc. My mother always included a pack of new razors to go with the shaving cream, some facial creams or mud packs, and just little things I might use. Sometimes I got one of those little tubes you carry in your purse or pocket full of Tylenol. My father would always make sure to put silly little toys in mine - goofy novelties, like a light up yo-yo, silly putty, sour “kid” candy (with cartoon characters or similar), pocket games, stickers, temporary tattoos, etc. Silly, fun stuff. Occasionally I’d find a little box with a nice piece of jewellery in it - nothing too extravagent or expensive, but nice.
Since moving out here, my FIL has taken me under his wing, and began making me up a stocking each year. Again, it’s full of candy and treats, goofy little toys (he likes to get stocking fodder at Archie McPhee’s): Pez dispensers, bendy figures, toy airplanes, fun stuff. He also fills it with personal effects - little sample sized things, powders, creams, mouthwash, etc. As he said to me the first year: “I’m not trying to say you have bad breath or you stink, that’s just what we put in our stockings!” I wasn’t offended, since this is what I was used to. He also stuck little things in there like a gift certificate to my favourite bead store, Christmas socks with santa on them, candles, stuffed toys, etc.
Well, this is the first year I’ve ever made up a stocking for anybody. My husband mentioned that he wasn’t going to bother making up his father and brother a stocking this year, since he never seemed to know what to put in them, and found it such a hassle. I was aghast! They would be making stockings for us! So I told him I would do it. So, ths morning, bright and early, I armed myself with my shiny new debit card, and marched on down to the local drugstore. I bought a couple of nice velvet stockings (and a secret one for my husband that he doesn’t know about yet), and wandered, a little lost, up and down the aisles.
I picked out each person’s favourite candy, then felt overwhelmed. I began to panic! What next? Who would like what? I’ve never bought for men before, besides my father and husband, but I know them so well. Usually, gifts to my FIL and BIL are combined - my husband picks them out things he knows they want, I wrap them and we sign both of our names to them. What to do? I picked out some little samples, then some decorated nail clippers (everyone needs nail clippers!), then I found some playing cards… my BIL loves cats, so I got him one with cats on it, and my FIL one with dogs, a little notebook for each of them, and some pens, some Sharpie minis, then a money clip for each of them, and the next thing I knew, I was a roll. I think tomorrow or Saturday, I will pop into Archie McPhee’s and finish them both off with whatever goofy little novelties I can find.
I’m feeling pretty good about it. When my husband came home, I dumped out their new stockings to show him what I had picked out, and he told me I’d done a better job than he ever had. I thought it looked like the same standard fare. He wasn’t just being nice, either; even with his darling wife, my husband isn’t the kind of guy to give an empty compliment. So I beamed, even though I wonder what I did any different. I feel satisfied. I done good.
So, what do you put in your family’s stockings, or what do you usually get in yours if you get one at all?
