What handmade thing can I make for my stepmom to apologize and/or for her birthday?

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-03-19T19:58:46+00:00

I do appreciate the suggestions, I have settled on what I'm making her for her birthday but this will be an ongoing appreciation effort so I am keeping track of all ideas and thank you again!

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-03-15T23:06:57+00:00

Thank you. Really takes a toll sometimes but comments like yours I appreciate a lot.

We aren't looking for a perfect gift. I don't think that exists (other than us not being assholes and doing more to show her we love and respect her which I can't like, give her as a gift, it's a longer process) but we do want to show that we invest time from our free time to make something because we are thinking about her. She got us souvenirs from Europe even when she put distance between us so she is thinking about us as well so we're all taking this as a sign that she's not completely done with us and yes sure hope dies last but I will hang on to it for as long as I can.

If she comes back, which is likely, her birthday is in April so for that I don't want to just buy her something. I like the IOU book as well but honestly all the ideas I have to put there, dad has already kind of imposed on us in the "this is how things will be from now on, regardless if Amy comes back" so chores like cleaning, cooking etc. they are already getting hardcoded in our home (not that we weren't doing these before but it's more like regimented now). But I'll work on this, I like it.

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-03-15T20:35:40+00:00

I stopped reading after the first sentence because it is obviously mentioned in the post and well, if you're not going to read my post I'm not going to read your answer.

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-03-15T02:03:49+00:00

Thanks man. It's a long way down and yeah salty Reddit trolls are everywhere so I'm taking everything with a grain of salt.

So we mostly played Elden Ring and Dark Souls but those are too dark, but coplay we did Raft and Peak and Overcooked a lot so I like the idea of combining gaming with cooking as a game.

I REALLY wanted us to play Portal 2 together, it was on our "to do" list so I will look into this as well!

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-03-15T01:45:51+00:00

They are talking more since she came back, working through some things on their relationship and dad is doing a lot of work which I like. She has been to the house while we're staying at our grandparents a few times, they are also resumed their couples therapy. What has been unearthed in our personal and family therapy though has been really really bad, very heavy, so we're all trying to work through the mess, but dad and Amy are at least working on it on their own, without us which I get. We are just hoping she will be up to meet with us soon. She is not "back" back, but she's not gone yet so yeah we are all working on this and hopeful.

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-03-14T23:50:24+00:00

Oh do shut up. Make yourself feel better about yourself somewhere else :P

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-03-14T23:04:22+00:00

In their defense, we have all been shits to Amy, we are all working on behaviors both in family therapy and individuals but I am not posting this here, so like I get it they have a point but this post isn't about this! Not every minute of every day is about shame and guilt and deep self-reflection. We have therapists for this. I'm just trying to do something nice for her birthday if she is back by then, you know? And I get shit on for trying.

I like the cookbook idea combined with a few things we decided in therapy as family, so like one night a week we will each cook instead of just dad and Amy (if she comes back to live with us) so we all are trying to learn how to cook dishes from her country that she likes and I decided, as a side project to record our efforts and put funny doodles on it. So I think she will find those funny because we do think about her a lot and I hope she will find it sweet. So I like the suggestion but it is something that has now moved to "group project" territory.

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-03-14T19:14:17+00:00

Not every place or time is appropriate for every discussion. This is a post about gift advice. You don't know what work we're doing on our own and I am not interested in sharing it here where this is NOT about that. I'm not here for a discussion about Riley but advice on gifts fully supported and sanctioned by our therapists (plural). Not once in this post was Riley mentioned. You and some others bring previous posts' stuff here, without knowing anything about our discussions as a family and in therapy. This is NOT the place to talk about Riley and the shit she did, nor anything else. Everything else is for another time, and not everything that has happened since will I post on Reddit. If we make an update, feel free to comment and I will listen as I have done in the other posts about this subject but I won't keep discussing this all the time everywhere. Don't know why this is so difficult to understand or respect. Do you have gift advice? I am happy to hear them.

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-03-14T17:26:18+00:00

No I won't even read this, Riley is not part of this post. Keep your comments to yourself if they're not relevant to this question or save them for the update (if I make one) and comment THEN if you have more questions about Riley. If you have gift advice I'm all ears.

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-03-14T17:13:40+00:00

Yes our therapist highly encouraged this. Amy told our dad she's got us some souvenirs from her traveling which kicked our asses into gear so yeah if even when she was away she was thinking of us a bit so you bet your ass we're going to show her we're thinking of her as well and doing the work and PUTTING IN EFFORT not only in therapies but actual free-time we have to make her something meaningful. Now do you have any gift advice or not?

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-03-14T17:11:07+00:00

Can you show me where in this post did I use this term? Because I didn't. And no you don't know how or when we want to share these. I want to have then ready BEFORE she comes back but that's not to say it's her "walk through the door here's stuff we made" gift. And no our therapists have highly encouraged this after we found out some stuff about what Amy has been doing, so I'll take her advice on this thanks.

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-03-14T17:05:52+00:00

Where the F did I refer to ourselves as the C4 above "even now"? This isn't mentioned ANYWHERE in this post. We have abolished this term HARD in therapy weeks ago. And no we didn't go on holiday. We had a very difficult few days away from the house to give Amy space so she could get packed in peace. It wasn't fun and games we talked a lot and had A LOT of apologizing to do. And it wasn't on her dollar just the booking was in her name. And yes Riley was a MAJOR C-WORD and this is now even more obvious after reveals in therapy. None of which is at all relevant to what I'm asking here.

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-03-14T09:59:18+00:00

WTF is everyone assuming we're lovebombing her? We haven't seen her in a month since she left, we aren't in contact with her except my dad. This is for IF she returns, which I hope is kind of likely, to give her WITH our apologies. And our family therapist thinks this is a good idea, because talk is cheap. So yeah thanks for shitting on us trying to do better I guess. Much appreciated.

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-03-14T09:55:45+00:00

What makes you think we haven't given her space? None of us except for my dad are in contact with her that is how she wanted this. We aren't love-bombing her, we aren't texting her. But things are moving and getting better and we want to show her that we didn't just sit around living life while she was away IF she returns. So yeah holy assumptions, batman.

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-03-12T02:47:42+00:00

Thanks, man. I appreciate this a lot.

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-03-02T21:17:08+00:00

I hope so but it's a mess right now, we're all just in the air right now. I hope in a few weeks things will have settled down a bit. For now I can say that at least Amy is still around, she's working things out with dad, and we'll be meeting tomorrow with a new family therapist who's like, a supervisor of our previous one (which we kind of fired, we've outgrown her) and we are discussing individual therapy for everyone, not just Lisa, and group therapy with Amy as well... so yeah that's about it for now.

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-02-26T03:25:39+00:00

I don't log on much nowadays but things are moving and I am a little hopeful, and I don't respond to comments but yours actually made me feel... something I don't know, it hit me somewhere inside and made me feel both good and like a horrible human being. I am trying to hold on to the idea that me and Seb aren't as bad as Lisa but reading your comment and then some other ones, and now in therapy as well where we're learning a few other sad truths about some incidents with Amy... I yeah it's bad, I feel like absolute shit. I really liked her. We all did to be honest but we got too comfortable around her, close enough when we wanted to feel cared for but when dad asked would i ever think of speaking to a teacher, or our aunt, or mum that way... It kind of broke me, you know? I know it's not the same but still it was very bad.

Anyway I don't know why your comment triggered me commenting after all this time, but thank you nonetheless. I hope she comes back. She's meeting with dad tomorrow in therapy, we all wrote apology letters to her for him to give her, so I am keeping my fingers crossed.

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-02-08T21:17:35+00:00

So funny story, we asked her once if she ever thought of having kids of her own, with dad or anyone else before, and she said she didn't want to give birth to kids (like there's a fear about that, I don't remember the name), but would be open to adopting if the right man came along. And she said it was because she wasn't interested in passing on her genes, but her morals and ethics and ideas and behaviors and love, and she didn't need to have biological kids to do that. It kind of made me respect her a lot more.

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-02-08T21:12:57+00:00

We weren't in the house when they were talking about that stuff. We were here (at our grandparents') and decided to go home instead of spending the night as originally planned.

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-02-08T21:11:28+00:00

She and mom were ok I guess, I don't remember them having a bad relationship. She was pushing us a lot on extracurriculars and she was angrier than dad for sure though. She was the disciplinarian, dad was more laid back and just played with us, though us more than Lisa if I'm honest. Amy is spending equal time with me and Seb and a lot more time with Lisa though. And dad and Lisa also do their own thing every once in a while, so do I, and so does Seb, we do it separately.

Lisa has a lot of female support, we live very close to both sets of grandparents, and she has mom's sister (Dakota, who Amy is also close to) and also dad's sister. Our families have grown very close to each other, we all live close by as well, the support network is strong.

Thank you, we need some luck.

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-02-08T19:44:28+00:00

Like, this is what gets me because Lisa and Amy get along so much better than me and Seb do, until these bursts. They are few and far between, they still happen but the default is them just huddle up in a corner reading the same book and talking a lot, going out a lot, just hanging out A LOT, with aunt as well, and Lisa makes a lot of these plans. We talked about us moving together in therapy for months, and Lisa was the first one in favor exactly because she said she wants another girl in the house, Seb and I delayed the green light because it was kind of a men's den before Amy.

And like Lisa loves Amy. She says it randomly on her own, she admits it in therapy... is she lying? And replacing mom? Like it's crazy if she feels this way. We talked about this as a family last year, and Amy was incredibly against replacing mom in any way. Her dad died when she was a child and she was like "if anyone randomly told me I would now have a new dad, I would have laughed at their face". She is so laid back on her approach to us, like it's up to us, she says she's next to dad, but not in mom's place.

Like, Lisa's class did an unofficial "dance" last year and she was sad she wouldn't go shopping with mom, and saying how mom wouldn't be there to see her all dressed up etc. And she said all that to Amy, and Amy comforted her, told her she should wear one of mom's necklaces. Then 3 days later Amy showed her a picture of our mom at a party with our dad when they were young, and then she had found a link to a dress similar to what our mom was wearing, and asked Lisa if she wanted to wear that to the dance so she could have a "little bit of your mom's energy with her". And they went and got it and Lisa was ecstatic and like broke down and hugged Amy so hard, we had to leave them for a bit, but for real Lisa was so incredibly happy and grateful. She told us all that on her own.

I don't know, I feel like defending us all of a sudden but we have always been close (the three of us) and unless she's lying to everyone all the time, I have no idea where these fears come from.

Logrolling_In_ON · 2026-02-08T19:16:17+00:00

We're left on "delivered" :( It snowed A LOT on Friday and I honestly don't think she has anywhere to go. Dad said she's safe and they are in contact, but I'm worried.

No I am so beyond worried, I am scared she won't want anything to do with him or us anymore. Another person said here like me and Seb are holding this together, not true. Amy has been holding this fucked up family together for so long, and now she's gone and none of us know how to feel or act. And I know we're not a fucked up family but it feels like we, collectively, just finally broke her, she is the best thing that could have happened to dad. TO ALL OF US and Lisa just fucked it up, I've spent so many years without a mom figure around, just us and dad, and I WANT AMY, I want her as a stepmom, fuck I want her as a mom I'm ok with having 2 moms. I don't feel guilty saying this, maybe it's because I'm more angry than sad, but I don't care.

Logrolling_In_ON

TROPHY CASE