The Best Gifts for Long-Distance Moms

Our senior editor, Jen Trolio, has been using Aura frames to keep in touch with long-distance family members since 2020, and they’re still bringing her parents joy. You and your siblings can contribute images through an easy-to-use app, keeping mom up-to-date with everyone’s photos.

Your mom should be as comfy as possible on a plane, and I’m a big fan of this memory-foam travel pillow that can also be inflated to her liking by pressing a hidden pump-up button.

There’s a lot of luggage going missing lately, but these sweet luggage tags come with an AirTag sleeve so she can keep track of her suitcase.

If you’ve requested a few items from your childhood bedroom, help your mom carry them with this capacious travel bag made from lightweight, washable nylon.

If your mom keeps in touch with you and the rest of the family via video chat, she deserves the best and easiest-to-use headphones. We’ve tested plenty of them, and AirPods are always a safe bet for smartphone use.

Blue-light-blocking glasses are thought to help prevent headaches and migraines that come with too much screen time. If Mom enjoys Zooming and FaceTiming with you, she might appreciate this stylish tortoiseshell pair of reading glasses that we’ve named the very best blue-light readers you can buy, owing to their stylish design and solid frames.

This superlong ten-foot charging cable is one of our most reliably life-changing gift recommendations, and it means Mom’s Instagram and TikTok sessions will never have to end.

As all real crossword fans know, the Wednesday puzzle hits that sweet spot of being neither too tricky nor too simple to solve over a morning cup of coffee. Which makes for a fun collaborative experience if you two tend to text each other clues.

A subscription gift will keep reminding your mom that you’re thinking of her. This one is ideal for jigsaw fiends and will have her fitting pieces together all summer long.

If she’s more into arranging flowers than puzzle pieces, Fresh Sends curates the best seasonal bunches.

You and Mom can take one of these foodie-friendly virtual cooking classes — which are led by chefs from around the world — together. I like the sound of the Greek one.

Or you could virtually work out together, choosing from Alo’s many on-demand and livestreamed yoga, fitness, and mindfulness classes.

Trade Coffee uses a quiz to match recipients with one of more than 400 coffees in its collection, curated from roasters spread across the U.S., so even the most serious coffee-snob moms should find something to suit their taste.

Strategist’s Vox Media cousin, Eater, has a wine club that curates a monthly selection of either two or four bottles.

With Atlas Tea Club’s tea-of-the-month-club membership, she’ll get to enjoy single-origin teas from around the world and tell you about her new favorites each time you guys FaceTime.

This printer rescues trapped smartphone photos from a camera roll. I especially like this as a gift for crafter moms who enjoy scrapbooking, but it has all sorts of other, more practical applications, too. (Susan Orlean uses hers to organize the shoe boxes in her closet.)

Book of the Month will send your mom a list of new fiction each month, then send her a copy of the book she’s most interested in.

If Mom lives far away from not only you but your own kids, this grandparent-approved “paper time capsule” with back-and-forth prompts will make the pen-pal process easy so she can keep in touch with her grandchildren.

Our testers dubbed this “the most giftable photo book,” and indeed Strategist senior editor Ailbhe Malone recently gave one to her mom, featuring photos of her new grandchild.

Strategist associate editor Jeremy Rellosa got this motion-sensor bird feeder (which snaps pictures and videos of visiting cardinals and swallows) for his parents as a Christmas gift, and it has been a hit — to the extent that his family group chat has “started to feature more updates about birds than humans,” he says.

If you recently moved back to your own place after spending much of the past year back home, there’s a chance Mom is feeling tender about becoming an empty nester again.This (cool enough for summer) weighted blanket from our guide of the best ones to give should help replicate a good old hug year-round.

Whether she’s missing you or simply worried about the world at large, we’ve found that this soothing sleep spray (which Strategist contributor Diksha Basu says works better than melatonin), can help.

Another highly giftable sleep aid is this silk eye mask from Drowsy, with adjustable straps and pillowy padding. The mask’s fan base includes actress and comedian Kate Berlant, who once told us, “I worry that my dependence on this thing will alter the course of my life.”

For moms who fall asleep listening to podcasts every night, Lena Dunham’s favorite sleep earbuds are designed to stay in the ear even when you toss and turn all night. “They can also tell when you have fallen asleep and switch from true crime to white noise,” she explains. “It helps with insomnia.”

A simple and stylish hat that’ll suit her new beach lifestyle.

Because she deserves a break, here’s a plant baby that doesn’t require too much nurturing.

This fluffy, doughnut-shaped dog bed comes recommended by several members of the Strategist team, including senior writer Liza Corsillo.

She can still feel the pulse of the city by reading New York in print.