How To Put Together A Gift Basket

Hi Peachies! Today's post goes along with yesterday's post on How To Host A Snail Mail Gift Exchange.

Today i'm going to share How To Put Together A Gift Basket. I love giving baskets full of goodies. My sweet neighbor kinda turned me on to this idea when she started giving me baskets full of goodies for my birthday. It's something i've totally adopted in my gift giving because now, not only do my neighbor and I exchange these wonderful gift baskets, I also give them to everyone.

I gave my mom one for her birthday full of her favorite things mixed with a few of my favorite things I thought she'd like. We also gave one to my Aunt & Uncle who so graciously let us use their house for our engagement pics last year and hosted our reception, too. It was Italian themed with pasta and different sauces, wine glasses, and wine and a gift certificate to the restaurant where he proposed to her.

*I'm working on a secret one now for someone very special and close to me but I can't share details yet. Stay tuned to find out more on that.*

Any gifts are awesome, don't get me wrong but my favorite ones to give and receive are baskets filled to the brim with goodies because it says that the person who gave the gift really thought about you. It's not like they ran into Target, picked up the first cute thing they saw and called it a gift. Which, I mean, there isn't much in Target I don't want but this is a really thought out, heartfelt gift.

The hard part of these baskets is often figuring out what to put in them. If you come up with a theme, it's easier but still, it takes time to put it all together. I'm the kind of person who either has a theme or wants everything to kind of flow. I usually pick out a color I want to center around if I don't have a theme. For my Grandma's Christmas Gift Basket it ended up being Lavender (because that color looks really pretty on her) with Cream accents. Sadly I don't have pictures of that one but it was really pretty.

So for starters I pick out a theme or color and I build off that.

This one was for my sweet sweet neighbor for her birthday. I started with the pink cheers koozie and built off that.

She's like me. She loves bright, happy, and cheerful. We both love make up and nail polish, too.
So finding things for her is never hard.

It can be a bit more challenging when you do a gift swap and don't know anything about your partner.
That's why I put together this survey for my Sunshine Snail Mail friends since the idea of a gift swap like this is getting to know someone else.

You can always ask anyone you give gifts to these questions, too.

Sunshine Mail Survey
Just copy this & paste it in the group with your answers filled in.
Tell us a little about yourself.
Name:
My Monogram is:
Birthday:
Relationship Status:
Anniversary:
Kids:
Pets:
Occupation:
These are my favorite colors:
Some of my favorite things are:
Hobbies:
Colors/Themes in your house:
I love to shop here:
Gift cards from here are awesome:
I blog at:
Instagram/Facebook/Pinterest:
P.S.-


For the last Sunshine Snail Mail Gift Swap I hosted, of course I knew my partner but it had been a while since we had connected.
We were friends in middle school then lost touch then got back in contact through Facebook so it was a lot of fun to shop for her.

Here's what I got her.

+notecards
+paper straws
+planner
+to do list
+magnetic board that you write your plans for the week on
+follow your arrow bracelet that I made
+candle
+grapefruit burts bees
+grapefruit body spritz
+grapefruit lotion
+mug

She's a mom of two, a wife, she works and she juggles life just like the rest of us so I knew all the stationary and the planner would come in handy and from her survey answers I found out she loved grapefruit everything. And the best part is that most of it came from the Dollar Spot at Target.


Since gift buying can be hard I thought I'd share with you some ideas for themes:

-Movie Night (popcorn, movie theater sized candy boxes, a movie, cute popcorn boxes, popcorn seasoning)
-Italian Themed (cute shaped pasta, gourmet pasta sauce, loaf of french bread, dipping bowls, oils,wine glasses, wine)
-Warm & Cozy (fuzzy socks, blanket, mugs, hot chocolate, coffee, a book)
-Monogrammed (I feel like the possibilities are endless here. Tee shirts, mugs, iphone accessories, notebooks)
-Spa Day (towel wrap, lotions, body wash, nail polish, massage oil, candles)
-Summer Fun (Magazines, towel, floats, plastic cups with straws, sun glasses, fun string lights, flamingopineapplewatermelon everything)


I always feel like mugs, monograms, candy, stationary, office supplies, candles, and make up make good gift basket fillers.
Those are always my "go to" items when i'm doing one of these and the best part is, most of these things can be found in the Target Dollar Spot or places like Marshall's/TJMaxx and Five Below.

The possibilities are endless so happy gifting friends!