For a wedding gift I designed and commissioned some diamond earrings, had them sent to her room as she was getting ready on the wedding morning. The entire bridal party was pissed off at me because they all cried and ruined their make-up 8)
For a birthday I once got her a day’s rally driving, doing laps of an abandoned airfield in a Hyundai Coupé and and Evo VI. Both were ex-WRC cars and quite nippy, apparently. She still talks about that one.
One time when we were in a small rural town here in NZ, she went into an arty-crafty shop and saw a necklace she liked, carved from merino horn. I was outside at the park with the wee man. Later, the friends she was with mentioned that she had seen a necklace she really liked and gave a very vague description. I rang the shop, and between me and the owner, and some emailed photos, managed to work out which one it was (small shop, not many customers!) and bought it. She’d never mentioned it to me and couldn’t work out how I’d known.
I bought her a painting for her last birthday, she’d seen it on the wall of a café and said how much she liked it – and she’s not normally one for admiring such things. So I bought it but had it left on the wall of the café for a few months so she wouldn’t get suspicious that it had disappeared once she said she liked it. It’s an original work by a local artist, the only proper bit of art either of us has ever bought.
One that sort of back-fired, but more for her than me – for our tenth wedding anniversary I had a necklace made to match the earrings from the wedding day. Her mother was staying at ours so we could get away for a rare-as-unicorn-poo weekend without the boy. Went up to the big smoke to see the Cirque du Soleil (Noire – it’s very good btw), got our smart duds on. As she was getting ready I stepped up beside her, and was just about to say “you know what would look good with those earrings…” thinking that as it’s our tenth wedding anniversary and a rare fancy* night out, she’d be wearing those earrings and the necklace would be a winner.
But she hadn’t brought them. Bloody useless, some days I wonder why I keep her around…
*yes, we have low standards 🙂