Oh gifts are so hard! They're part of our culture, both in most families and at large. We've experienced friction in our own extended families because of differing values regarding gifts. It's astounding how people create expectations on what constitutes an acceptable gift. I have one family member who has expectations on how much money should be spent for a gift to be "good" -- needless to say she's continually disappointed.
Is the gift for the tween boy a birthday or other gift (graduation, etc.)? Do you usually give gifts to this boy? Are you asking because you feel the desire to give a gift, or because you feel obligated? If you feel obligated, I would look to see where that comes from. If you truly want to, I would send cash. Gift cards just control where a person has to spend their money, and often the person either has to add money to it to get what they want, or they leave a few dollars on it and never use it again, meaning the store basically keeps the extra. I just received an Amazon gift certificate for my birthday (unasked for, from my MIL). I didn't want anything from Amazon. After much thinking, I decided what I wanted was an artisan lame from a woodworker on Etsy. I ordered that for myself and will use the Amazon money for our Subscribe and Save order.
Also, as an interesting side note, my own sons typically save any cash they receive as gifts, and are far more mindful about what they choose to spend the money on eventually, whereas with gift cards/certificates they feel pushed to choose something ASAP, whether it's something they truly want or not. It amazing how the cash makes them stop and think -- a good lesson, I think.
Over the past three decades, we started with "everyone gets a gift" (including aunts, uncles, cousins, et al.) because we were young and it was expected. Then we started whittling down the list, starting by eliminating the relatives farther out. Now we're at the point where nieces and nephews under 18 (or who are 18 but haven't graduated from high school yet) receive birthday and Christmas gifts, and we give gifts to our parents. Period. No birthday or holiday gifts for our siblings or adult nieces and nephews. We only achieved this full stop in 2019, when we made it clear we were done messing around with gift exchanges, dirty Santa games, etc. We were absolutely tired of receiving gifts we didn't need or want, and also tired of giving gifts that were received lukewarmly (we would give consumable and/or handmade gifts). Last Christmas we did a donation to Heifer Intl. in the name of our families, alerting them ahead of time that we had zero intention of giving any other gifts. Finally, after many attempts, our siblings didn't give us gifts.
(For our own reasons, we've scaled back Christmas giving and have chosen to focus on birthdays as the more important gift giving opportunity for our parents and our sons. Christmas isn't about them, but their birthdays are. We pushed our focus for Christmas away from the secular, reclaiming it as a religious holiday, and it now has more joy for us than ever before.)
We do give graduation gifts (cash) but only for high school and college (not preschool, kindergarten, elementary, or middle school), and only if we have a connection with the young person graduating. I don't send graduation gifts to the children of old friends I don't keep in touch with but who send me a graduation announcement anyway -- it's a total cash grab.
We've simplified the gift giving to a place where we feel comfortable with what we give. For my MIL's last birthday, we gave her a security light she asked for (and DH went and installed it), and we paid for the birthday meal my BIL arranged -- he arranged it, but technically his birthday was also being honored, so even though we didn't give him a gift, we felt fine paying the check. For my dad we gave him cash. For my oldest son's birthday we paid for a nice meal out and bought him an expansion for a game he loves. For my youngest son's quarantine birthday, we bought him a Kindle -- he'd broken his somehow, and while we weren't about to replace it for that reason, we didn't mind buying a new one (on sale) for a gift.
If you truly want to give a physical gift to the tween, I would ask the parents if there is an interest or hobby the tween has that might have a magazine to go with it. Over the years my youngest has enjoyed a gift subscription to Make Magazine, and my oldest a subscription to Road Bike Action and Mountain Bike Action. These were easy gifts for the grandparents to give, and have the benefit of arriving every month or every other month, stretching the gift.
