The season of gift-giving is upon us and although it’s supposed to be a festive activity to get you in the Christmas spirit, it can sometimes be a tiring obligation that empties your energy resources as well as your wallet.

But think about it for a second - in desperate need to make others happy we tend to forget about the most important person - ourselves. Don’t you have the right to enjoy Christmas and the time spent with loved ones? Yes, you do! That’s why we present you the KUMA gift guide.

Now, if you are rolling your eyes thinking that this will be another gift guide telling you what to buy, you should stop there, because I can assure you, it’s not. With the help of our creative director Mari, we compiled this guide to help you with the difficult task of choosing the right gifts. We will not tell you what to buy for the Libra or Scorpio in your life, but we will give you three steps that make gift giving enjoyable and exciting again both for you and your loved one.

Step One: The aim of the gift💘

Firstly, think about the aim of your gift. Do you want to surprise someone, create a beautiful memory or simply make someone smile and bring positive emotions for that special someone? Figuring out what the underlying concept of your gift will be, can help make the process faster by eliminating other options.

Once you have the aim of the gift, it’s time to visualise! Put yourself in the shoes of the gift receiver and visualise what he or she needs the most right now. If the answer is money, then pause for a bit. Money doesn’t carry good energy and therefore is not the best gift.

What is also something that every person needs in their hectic everyday life? Some time for themselves, of course! So, give them the spoil-yourself gift! 👑 

Time is something that you know the gift receiver would love, but wouldn’t buy for themselves. Of course the perfect spoil-yourself gift depends a lot on the person, but it is usually something that doesn’t carry much practical value. However, it can make the person feel like a child before the Christmas morning - excited and surprised.

Step Two: We know we have said it a thousand times, but still - energy is everything💫

Another thing you want to think about, before choosing the right gift, is energy.

Everything carries an energy with it, and although sometimes we like to close our eyes and not think about how some things or people make us feel, we can’t ignore the effect it has on us.

Even if something is beautiful and/or expensive, it’s not worth the effort, if it doesn’t make the person feel good. Take jewellery, for example - we all have a pair of earrings somewhere in our drawer, that was given to us or maybe we bought them ourselves, but we rarely wear them. Sometimes the reason is obvious - maybe the material was cheap and the earrings give you an allergy or a rash, but sometimes, we just don’t want to wear them. They might have been beautiful in the store or in the gift box, but for some reason, you never reach for them and still grab your favourite everyday earrings, that were half the price and not as sparkly, but you know you feel good when you wear them.

That is the energy speaking to you! Now, how does a piece of jewellery get its energy? Well, we believe that there are two main components that make up an energy for jewellery - the material and the production process. Make sure you do your research beforehand and get to know, how the products were made, by whom, in which condition and where did the materials come from.

Someone who is underpaid, suffering of hunger or in any other way mistreated, doesn’t have enough positive energy to put into their work, they might even hate the job they are doing and put that strong negative energy in their work.

Would you want your loved one to wear that kind of negative energy around their neck or in their ears? That is why we choose our craftsmen extremely carefully, since we know the value of handmade products made with passion and love.

Step Three: The environment and materials🌍

As we mentioned before, another factor that contributes to the energy of a gift is materials.

Here we only have one piece of advice: you can never go wrong with choosing natural materials because they create good energy around them.

Think about clothes for example - what we are wearing affects how we are feeling. If something is itchy, too close to our body or makes us sweat, it is clearly made of synthetic materials that make our body fight against it. On the contrary, a piece of clothing made from natural materials can make us feel like someone is giving us a warm hug all day long.

Since we are very proud of the Estonian designers, who have the same principles about materials as we do, we have two favourite brands we want to share with you: Woolish and Mywoolwalk. Both of these brands are Mari’s personal favourites, who make high-quality products using only natural materials. If you live or visit Tallinn, then we recommend to visit cute Estonian design shops that have a wide variety of natural and handmade products: Les Petites, TALI, Scandikids, Estonian Design House and Must pop-up store.

We hope that you found some new ideas or a new angle to approach the gift giving process. Stay tuned for next week, when we will share Mari’s most memorable gifts that she has both received and given to others.