Things you learn.

There are things in life that you learn because someone (or something) teaches them to you (whether you want that or not). Then there are things you learn because you want to learn them. And then there are things that you just... pick up.

One thing that I picked up from my mum is keeping a small stash of things suitable for presents. These are usually smallish things with a limited price that we see sometime, somewhere, during the year and think "that would make a perfect present for X!"

So we buy it. And then we put it into the stash... and when we are thinking about what to give to X as a present the next time a birthday or Xmas comes around, we check the stash.

It's too late to help anyone this year, but that's a practice I can really, really recommend. It makes finding presents fun, it spreads the spending a little more (though we don't give expensive presents, as a rule, in our circle; it's more giving something small but picked with thought, or if it's a larger thing, we give it as a group), and it saves a lot of headaches and stress when an occasion comes up. Plus you have a fallback for short-notice presents that might be needed.