Ariana Madix Reveals Which Vanderpump Rules Costar Got Her the Most Memorable Holiday Gift (Exclusive)

Ariana Madix appreciates a good holiday gift — especially one that helps protect her.

The Vanderpump Rules The alum, 39, tells PEOPLE that her longtime friend and co-star Scheana Shay once gave her a snowboard helmet, which she considered one of her most memorable items.

“Helmets are important,” says Madix. “Everyone should wear helmets, whether they’re snowboarding, skiing, riding horses, riding motorcycles.”

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Vanderpump Rules Season 11 Cast: Katie Maloney, Ariana Madix, Tom Sandoval, Lisa Vanderpump, James Kennedy, Lala Kent, Tom Schwartz, Scheana Shay.

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But Madix explains: “I have a small head, so sometimes it’s hard when you go to hire things. I have to try on the kid-sized helmets.”

The Island of love USA The host said that Shay got her her own helmet, and it “was great because we went on a trip soon after, and I was able to not only look cute because it’s pink, but also be safe.”

Madix and Shay have been friends ever since Vanderpump Rules debuted in 2013, when Shay was working as a waitress and Madix as a bartender at Lisa Vanderpump’s restaurant, SUR. Over the course of 11 seasons, the pair remained close as they navigated breakups, changes in group dynamics, and expanding careers outside of SUR.

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Ariana Madix (L) and Scheana Shay (R) on February 22, 2023 in Los Angeles, California.

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As for Madix’s gift-giving skills, she tells PEOPLE while discussing her new holiday partnership with DSW, “Every time there’s a gift, I get really stressed.”

“I’m not that good at it. I try and come up with really lofty big ideas for gifts, and then I overthink it and then if one part of it doesn’t work out, I get really stressed,” she explains. “Then the day comes and I end up just going crazy and getting something that isn’t exactly what I wanted.”

She admits that when she’s getting ready to give gifts to her boyfriend, Daniel Wai, she likes to make a notepad on her phone to jot down ideas for when Wai says he “likes something or would get this if he didn’t want to spend on it for himself.”

Ariana Madix on May 9, 2024 in Beverly Hills, California.

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“I have a little list there that I’ll go and collect things from,” she says. But despite her diligence, “he’s a giver.”

“He already knows what he wants to get. He’s already provided me with, I think, most of it,” she says, calling him “the best giver I’ve ever met in my life.”

Madix and Wai, a fitness influencer, were first linked in April 2023, a month after Madix found out her longtime boyfriend Tom Sandoval was cheating on her with their Vanderpump Rules actress Rachel “Raquel” Leviss. In April, Madix and Wai were spotted spending time together at Coachella, and the following month, a source told PEOPLE that the reality star had already “fallen in love” with Wai.

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Source: HIS Education