Credit-crunching Christmas - please may we have your survival tips?

do they still bang when you pull them?

We buy the £3 for 6 make your own crackers in tesco and fill them with little treats that everyone will like. Costs about £8 all in but much better than crap that's in normal crackers.

TMH - how do you make your own crackers?

RSOHH, we have a Mrs Beeton recipe that makes multiple puddings and in spite of having halved the quantities, we still end up with two or three. So we keep one for Christmas and save the other(s) for subsequent years, by which time they become deliciously mature and almost black. The secret is to make sure that you put in enough alcohol to preserve them which, together with the alcohol we use to set them alight, makes them ultra-tasty!

ecpensive? Oh you know what I mean!

overthehill, why do you put puddings in the attic? or am i just being thick and everyone does this???

This year we have bought the DC's presents from a catalogue, it's a little bit more ecpensive, but it allows you to pay interest free over 20 weeks. Plus I had £50 in commission, so that helped a lot!

Plus, our 6mth old is too young to understand about christmas, so he is getting essentials wrapped up - vests, sleepsuits, clothes etc... and just a few toys (he has all DS1's toys from when he was a baby, so he doesn't really need anything.

I'm very lucky that my MIL does all the cooking over the christmas period, right up until 2nd Jan! So we don't have to buy any extras WRT food!

Haven't read tha whole thread but my biggest tip is - don't have a huge present-buying circle. We don;t buy for brothers/sisters/other adults who can feasibly buy their own tat. We only buy for neices/nephews and my/dh mum. DH will have a max of £50 for something he needs, ditto for me.

Don;t buy masses of food - one big turkey (frozen) will cover most of the meals over the 3-4 days in our house. I laugh when I see menu-ideas for chrismas ie christmas eve dinner - salmon. christmas dinner - turkey. Boxing day - Ham. Day after boxing day - lamd/pork/chicken casserole (because we are all fed up with turkey WTF?) .

And don't buy mince pies, no-one eats them, it's only because they are THERE! Ditto chocs/nuts/sweets/peanuts.

My dh is thinking of buying some cheap canvasses and painting pics of family for them, eg pic of bil's baby daughter etc. You would have to be artistic for that one I guess though.

I agree with Eniddo.
Set a budget and stick to it.

I'm going to do Xmas for 200 quid this year.
All in pressies food and wine.

I did it for 300 last year - I'm self employed, so credit crunch is a perma feature in my house

I buy subscriptions to national geographic for near and dears, and make our own cards.

I'm also thinking of supporting my fav charity endfistula.org and buying cesarean sections again this year, and telling everyone that's what their pressie is.

If you haven't got it don't spend it!! Chrstmas is about spendong time as a family not receiving shed loads of expensive gifts.

Little uns do not know the price of anything, my 4 yr old DS would be as happy with a jigsaw as a huge £50 toy.

Never let little kids watch anything other than Cbeebies/ Cbbc, therefore no ads and no "i want that"!!

We have asome family friends who are all extremely well of and could spend a fortune on each other. They don't. They set a limit taht you have to spend no more than £10 on each other (grown ups) and no more than £50 on the kids. They say it is far more fun seeing how far you can stretch the £10 and gets ridd of all the ridiculous exchange of things you don't want!!

My tips:

Do Xmas don't buy it.

Get present buying over and done with in Nov then you can forget about it (toiletries for ladies, wine/food for men, 1 gift for DCs and stocking).

Make Xmas decs with DCs and trot out same Decs every year (nostalgia value).

Meal plan for all main meals so that you know what food to buy.

Go to local Am dram panto (ours if fabulous!)

If in doubt get smaller stockings and a small tree (and small diner plates if need be LOL).

Visit friends and family and play silly games.

Get Xmas in perspective when DCs are small then they have more reasonable expectations when older.

Keep calm, relax and have fun .

I have not read the whole thread but MP's 'we would prefer a bottle of wine than a goat' really made me laugh.

Someone was asking the other day what they should buy someone who has everything and I said 'buy them a goat'. He thought it was a good idea until he realised that it wasn't a frozen goat that they could put in their freezer. I wet myself.

Do people really buy new decorations each year??? One of the things I love about Christmas is getting out the boxes of decorations as they're part of the history of our current family - and even that of past generations eg we have tree decorations that I and dh had as children as well as those we have collected over the years, and they all bring back such memories! We always buy a real tree (one of those non-shedding ones) and the dc's love decorating it with the gradually increasing numbers of baubles etc and old sets of lights (which we have to remember to check before the shops close on Christmas Eve as we put up our tree as late as possible).

Re stockings: a tradition in dh's family is to put a bauble in the stocking to hang on the Christmas tree, but I must say, I'm very surprised about the pants: firstly that so many people receive(d)/give them and that nearly everyone talks about pants rather than knickers as we're knicker-people! Stockings always contain a clementine and some chocolate coins, plus a few silly things eg from Hawkin's Bazaar and a few essentials (eg gloves, facecloth - but no knickers...)

We're vegetarians and it's about the only time in the year when we have a nut roast. It doesn't cost a fortune and we make our own pudding and cake: traditionally ds and dh do this at half term (tho' puddings only every other year as one goes in the attic), and this duly happened last week. We always set the pudding alight, but cheap brandy burns just as well as more expensive stuff...

Unlike most other people, I've not even started thinking about presents, but we do have a 'present cupboard', into which goes stuff we pick up during the year as well as unwanted but re-usable gifts, and we write a list of people and try and match up as many gifts as we can to people on the list. We also have a huge box of used wrapping paper that has been removed carefully from last year's presents and can be reused, and we cut up old Christmas cards to make name labels.

We've been using Freecycle a lot recently and have acquired some bargains to replace broken items (eg 3 kitchen chairs, an easy chair, a CD player, a liquidiser, an electric kettle and a Sodastream so we can make our own fizzy water). In theory this should mean that we have a bit more money left to buy presents - when we finally get round to doing so. My ds unfortunately has 2 job-share teachers, but they'll probably get home-made cakes, and Grandma will get Historic Houses Association membership so we can take her with us to several of the stately homes round here for free - and, I think, get a free gift ourselves. Last year I ordered her some posh frozen meals from a website someone had recommended on Mumsnet and that went down really well (pardon the pun!).

The dc's?? Don't have a clue, and we have the added problem that dd's (13th) birthday is two weeks before Christmas. Some clothes may be in order and possibly an MP3 player; no ideas for ds yet, but no doubt inspiration will come...

We have decided to postpone Xmas Day (as far as presents go) and spend the money that we WOULD have spent, at the sales afterwards.
Not sure that pants will be any cheaper then though.
Baaah Humbug.

We do Secret Santa for the adults in my family and dh's; we do buy for the children though (four nieces/nephews), but I've bought books from the Book People for two of them to keep costs down.

I'm always astounded by how much food people buy at Christmas - it's as though a siege is about to start! Turkey will be from the butcher; last couple of years we've cooked our own ham in the pressure cooker - much cheaper; veg will be whatever arrives in the veg box; Christmas cake was made this weekend; dh always makes fudge for ds's teachers (wrapped in cellophane and tied with Christmas ribbon - looks very festive); dh and I used to make wrapping paper from brown parcel paper with potato printed stars or Christmas trees.

Christmas decs will be last year's - I do not understand the need to have 'this year's' - surely the point is that you get the same ones out each year (including the glitter covered fir cones made by the dcs)?

And the dcs always get pants in their stockings - I thought this was the law at Christmas??

Re: inviting family. tell them all that no decisions are being made about Christmas until around mid December.

By them they will have all made other plans, and then you can say, 'well, we were going to invite you (and all 15 children...) for Christmas dinner, but understand that you've made other plans...' That way you get all of the credit and none of the hassle.

Last year it got a bit silly, with all my and dh's uni friends having had children and us all giving and receiving presents from each other. So this year we have agreed no present pacts with most people, so the dc's will just be getting presents from extended family, and we just give to extended family, not all and sundry.
We started a tradition a couple of years ago of going to the beach (about 40 mins drive away so a treat but do-able) on Xmas Eve, all wrapped up warm - costs very little and is great fun, and then come home to mince pies and bed time.
We also started going to the (local) panto in the few days after Christmas; costs about £10 a person, so not too bad, and extends the Christmas season into the proper 12 days of Christmas, rather than it all being over on the day - there is still something to look forward to iyswim.
Agree you don't need much more food than normal - its just a roast,with maybe one or two more veg dishes than normal, and if you add those little sausages wrapped in bacon its very special without costing a fortune. We've never bought boxes of chocs, twiglets, nuts etc - just normal food for normal mealtimes.
Last year we had a party in the evening a couple of days before Christmas, and invited all the neighbours, just for mulled wine and mince pies. EVeryone was rather surprised but loved it, and it didn't cost much. We're going to do it again this year - gave a very warm Christmassy glow!
On Christmas day itself, it works best we've found if you can make it not all about the presents and food (and if the presents aren't the sole focus , it doesn't matter that they are all unwrapped within an hour). We've found what works best is stockings before breakfast, breakfast, church, lunch, presents, dinner.

With your friends and your kids friends, agree to not buy presents for eachother or their kids as it just gets out of hand. Offer to have their kids for a play date or babysit for eachother instead. You are then offering something worthwhile that everyone will enjoy and it's free! Let's barter!!!

it goes without saying that you should keep anything that you are given thats all 'added value' rather than real value - packaged bath stuff for example. Send it on next time you need a present.

if you are buying second hand toys, set it up ready to be played with in their room while they are doing something else christmassy then send them upstairs to get something. a second hand scalextric might look a bit mean without its box - all ready to go on the floor surrounded by chocolate coins is a joy

i started buying DD her prezzies in august and have gone for bargains and poundshop stocking fillers. she has asked for a baby annabell doll which i have found in B&M for 29.99 so that is the most expensive item i am buying her kids are just as happy with cheap pound shop toys than the expensive ones andwouldnt notice the difference until they are much older
TBH i was a child that got next to nowt at xmas and always felt left out as my cousins got loads but i remember one year my mum and dad got me and my sister a sackful of toys from the poundshop and pjs and knickers and it was great
pjs and pants are great for stocking fillers and i will be getting some for dd as a nice chrimbo eve treat
xx ei xx

If you are so inclined, make sacks/bags of varying sizes in jolly fabrics - old charity shop clothes are ideal, particularly trousers as you just need to sew up one end and hem the other. Tie the top with beautiful ribbon. Not only can you use these forever as wrapping paper, you will come to love them as part of your celebrations rather than resent the wrapping paper. Its a darn sight easier to plonk a gift in a bag and tie a bow with glass in hand than to faff about with sticky tape, which makes Christmas eve wrapping not only possible but rather enjoyable. Its more like looking through the things you bought than messing about with scissors. There is an outlay in work and cash this year, but you will never have to buy wrapping paper again - my mum did this and there was always a bit of holly or a bauble in the ribbon - we loved it.

join a wine club - I just joined the national trust wine club (which is a spin off from Laithwaites) and with the discount for being a new member I got 15 bottles of decent stuff for 39.99 - which is 2.67 a bottle. On top of that you get as a new member a 29.99 snazzy corkscrew thing that is a nice gift in itself. I now have 16 presents for 40 quid

rip long strands of ivy out of the hedgerow, and spray it a little bit gold (a dusting of colour, leave some green showing) - before it dries scatter with a tiny bit of gold glitter. Do this outside
This looks really lovely on the tree - in long swags it does what tinsel should have done - ie create some swirls among the baubles - but isn't nasty in the way tinsel is.

Similar thing with pine cones, teasel, seed heads from plants - the trick is to put the pine cone (or whatever) on a stick - like a lolly pop, and push it into the branches rather than hanging a pine cone from a string.