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By Madeline Holcombe, CNN

(CNN) — One of the best gifts Alyse Dermer, founder of luxury gift concierge service Mr. Considerate, ever got was a bracelet from early in her relationship with her husband.

They were on a trip together and stopped in a little store. She admired the jewelry, found a bracelet she loved and tried it on before putting it back in the case and moving along. Didn’t she want to buy it? No, she needed to be practical, she told him.

Weeks later, he was back at the shop, working with the clerk to figure out which one she had liked so much and get it for her.

What made that gift so special wasn’t the price tag or even how excited she was to get to wear it, Dermer said. It was that he cared enough to remember that she had liked it so much and went to all the trouble to find it again for her.

With Valentine’s Day coming up, Dermer is now busy helping her clients –– largely men in relationships with women –– scramble to find a gift for the occasion. And yes, being a thoughtful gift giver takes time and effort, but it isn’t impossible, she said.

She and other experts have guidance to help shake the myths that may keep you thinking that you can’t pick a good gift and make your partner feel loved this holiday.

“The perfect gift says, ‘I hear you, I see you, I appreciate you,’” Dermer said.

Instead of the ‘It Girl’ purse, a bag that solves a problem

A brand-name, luxury item, such as a popular designer bag, isn’t always the slam dunk that people think it will be, Dermer said.

She recommends a gift that shows you have been paying attention, and that takes time to pick. Before ever shopping, Dermer recommends her clients first prioritize observing their partner.

What stage of life are they in? Expensive lingerie for a mom who is three weeks postpartum is probably going to feel like you aren’t reading the room, she said. Are there things they use every day that could use an upgrade? Is there a problem you can solve for them?

Let’s say you think about the year ahead and realize you and your wife are going to seven weddings. Dermer might recommend buying an evening clutch that could make her feel extra special at all those events. Another client might have a partner who commutes to work and complains that her bag is too heavy, so he finds a lovely replacement that is light with good support, she said.

The key is finding something that your special someone can use regularly and might not have bought for themselves, and that shows that you are paying attention to their wants and needs, Dermer said.

That exercise isn’t as easy as picking up some flowers on the way home. Thoughtfulness like this means starting as early as you can and maybe even keeping a regular note about things you have heard them mentioning that they admire or need, she added.

Instead of a toaster, a scarf

There is a careful line, however, between solving a problem and going too practical.

While a gift your loved one can use regularly is often greatly appreciated, a toaster may fall flat, said Dr. Julian Givi, associate professor of marketing at John Chambers College of Business Economics at West Virginia University. His research focuses on consumer behavior in the context of gift giving.

This holiday is about a little luxury and pampering, which doesn’t have to be expensive, Dermer said.

Many people think that t

By Tim Lister, Kosta Gak, CNN

(CNN) — Hundreds of thousands of civilians in Ukraine face several days of extreme cold with very little heat and light, after sustained Russian drone and missile attacks on the country’s energy infrastructure.

In the capital, Kyiv, temperatures well below zero and bitterly cold winds are expected for the next four days at least.

“We must get through the next few days, which will be very difficult for Kyiv,” the city’s mayor, Vitaliy Klitschko, said Sunday. “Severe frosts are again forecast in the capital, especially at night,” he said on Telegram.

Klitschko said Ukraine’s energy infrastructure was in “an extremely difficult situation” and that he had issued instructions for communal “heating points,” powered by generators, to be fully functional. Some of these shelters allow people to stay overnight.

According to the energy ministry, residents of the capital are receiving electricity only for one and a half to two hours a day.

During a Russian strike in early January, one Kyiv resident who lived in an apartment at the top of a 16–story building at the time said he and his wife had lost heating, power and water.

The next Russian strike hit the power plant providing heat to the apartment block, as well as 1,100 other buildings in the capital, and he said about half of the residents had moved out of the building, including his family.

The average temperature in the apartment had fallen to just 3 degrees Celsius (37.4 degrees Fahrenheit), he added.

Residents were told that repairs could take two months – during the coldest part of the year.

Businesses also suffer. The Backstage Beauty Salon network says it invested $400,000 in back-up systems, including generators, fuel and batteries. But a drone had hit one of its salons, shattering a heating pipe and flooding the premises.

“Despite all this spending, weather conditions and Russian attacks prevail over the system,” the company posted on Instagram Saturday.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Telegram Sunday: “Almost every day, the (Russians) strike energy facilities, logistics infrastructure, and residential buildings… Over 2,000 strike drones, 1,200 guided aerial bombs, and 116 missiles of various types were launched by Russia at our cities and villages this week alone.”

Ukrenergo, the national grid company, said Sunday that it continued dealing with the aftermath of two massive missile and drone attacks on the power grid this week.

“The level of power shortages and damage to the electricity transmission and distribution networks currently prevents the lifting of emergency blackouts in most regions,” but repair work had made power cuts less severe in some regions, it said.

“Restoration work is continuing at both power plants and high-voltage substations that supply power to nuclear power plants.”

Another Ukrainian power operator, DTEK, said Saturday that damage to high-voltage substations had caused a reduction in output at nuclear power plants, leading to a significant loss of available electricity.

The latest Russian strikes followed a short-lived moratorium on attacks by each side on the other’s energy infrastructure, agreed at the urging of the United States.

Zelensky said Saturday that Washington had proposed “that both si

By Caitlin Danaher, James Frater, CNN

London (CNN) — The chief of staff to British Prime Minister Keir Starmer resigned on Sunday over the scandal around Peter Mandelson’s appointment as UK ambassador to the US, despite his links to disgraced financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

“The decision to appoint Peter Mandelson was wrong. He has damaged our party, our country and trust in politics itself,” Morgan McSweeney said in a statement to reporters on Sunday.

The Downing Street chief of staff is the most senior political adviser to the UK prime minister.

McSweeney said he took “full responsibility” for advising Starmer to make the appointment last year, adding “in the circumstances, the only honourable course is to step aside.”

“While I did not oversee the due diligence and vetting process, I believe that process must now be fundamentally overhauled. This cannot simply be a gesture but a safeguard for the future,” McSweeney said.

Starmer thanked the outgoing chief of staff for his service and commitment to the Labour Party. “It is largely thanks to his dedication, loyalty and leadership that we won a landslide majority and have the chance to change the country,” the prime minister said in a statement.

The most recent tranche of Epstein files released by the US Justice Department triggered a police investigation into Mandelson, who has been accused of passing on market-sensitive government information that was of clear financial interest to Epstein following the 2008 financial crisis. Police raided two of Mandelson’s properties on Friday as part of their investigation into misconduct in public office.

Mandelson resigned from the Labour Party last Sunday and quit the House of Lords, the upper chamber of Britain’s parliament, on Wednesday. CNN has been unable to contact Mandelson this week.

The Mandelson scandal has plunged Keir Starmer’s government into crisis and raised questions about the prime minister’s political judgment. Starmer appointed Mandelson as ambassador last year, despite his well-known friendship with Epstein, which continued after the financier was convicted in 2008 for soliciting prostitution from an underage girl.

CNN’s Christian Edwards contributed reporting.

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