Tacky tinsil and shop bought chutney, we love Christmas too thread.

[VoldemortsNipple]

For those like me who love Christmas and are slighty envious of the homemade Christmas threads, here's one for us.

A place to share the best bargains the internet has to offer. Confess our sins of being onto the third copy of Boots gift guide. Shout how much we love Aldi three bird roast with paxo stuffing. You get the idea.

I have a fab,classy posh black 6ft Chreistmas tree courtesy of Gumtree freebies...came with blue and silver decs in a John Lewis box [hwink]

When I had DD I was 19 and living in a horrid little flat with ExDP who didn't like Christmas. I always remember I'd been given a few pounds and I asked whether I could get a tree, he said yep, but a small one.

I went out with DD in the pram and bought a 6ft value one from Woolworths and all the baubles, lights and tinsel for about £30. I managed to balance it (in it's box) in the basket underneath the pram. He got a right shock when he got home [hgrin].

Nobody messes with my Christmas.

It's still the tree I use now, although it has certainly seen better days. I'm wondering whether to get a new one, though I am very attached to it. We've come a long way since then!

Awww Kinky...that's a lovely story. [hsmile]

I still miss Woolies

@ nanna I've ordered it plus extra roasties. This will be the first christmas in 10 years that I haven't cooked christmas dinner from scratch. I feel like burning some Bohica underwear!

Magneto I'm decorating our lounge and have a brown carpet and brown leather sofa. What colour walls do you have if you don't mind me asking and where do you fit the green scheme into it?

magnito how about a bronze and gold colour scheme.

Off to look at m&s to look at the festive feast....

Bohica I bet it's lovely [hwink]

Can I join please. I was going to do everything homemade but seriously can't be arsed!
I have got all of ds's presents and the stocking are done. We have chocolate advent calendars and I am starting on dd'd presents next month

Well since you asked...

Feature wall is this green. I originally planned to have some nice green patterned wallpaper but then decided that was too much effort (see I completely belong on this thread!).

The other three walls are brown, I can't remember what the brown was called but it looks like this one

The floor is crappy (was laid by the landlord) and looks like this. Not what I would choose but does brighten the room a bit.

The sofas (not leather , furniture and curtains are brown too so the overall effect is quite dark but that's what I wanted, we get a lot of sun in the front room so I didn't want it too bright. We also had a green rug (cheapy argos one because I knew what would happen to it with dh, ds and the cat) but after 6 months it looked horrendous and wouldn't clean properly so I chucked it a couple of weeks ago.

I'm thinking a gold, green and purple/maroon colour would look good for the decs?

Bronze and gold would be good.

Have to try and get to our local garden centre to look at the decs soon.

Sounds lovely, very cossy. The green paint is eally nice and DH's birth year! I was thinking of brown and green flowery wall paper on a feature wall and I'm so darn lazy I'm paying someone to decorate for me

Thanks for the reply

So christmas dinner and desert is sorted, I now need to find a nice seafood platter, smoked salmon and prawns for starters and pate. Nothing to pricey mind as the seafood is only for me and DD1.

Hmm purple tinsel from the market sound lush.

Ohh, can I join?

I'm full of good intentions about making stuff but am far too disorganised and never get round to it.

The M&S pre-Christmas shop is an institution for our family.

I love tinsel and gaudy crap. Our tree looks like a bomb's gone off in a firework factory. We have the freebie PG tips monkey on the top, wearing a (homemade ) set of pink marabou fluff wings

All welcome monsterbook and mistress as long as your not wIring for a hand made invitation :)

taffy singing santas are fine by me. We used to have a wreath which had a musical train going round which went off by a sensor. Bloody annoying thing it was, but the dcs loved it.

Are people actually buying Christmas stuff already then? Am I really slow off the mark?

I am thinking a gold and red theme. I live next door to a garden centre and am obsessed with looking at their decorations!

I'm only spending on Christmas now because we get work bonus in November so we are decorating the lounge and spoiling the girls for christmas. Money os normally quite tight but then the binus comes in and I can knowing I can spend spend spend for a change!

I am having to buy early as I am buying a new car tomorrow so all my money is took up on that

I've only bought one present but I'm planning on starting this payday. We are going to a wedding over Christmas in Dublin so realistically we only have 2 paydays left.

We usually get our cost of living allowance backdated from April, in November. We didn't get one last year and I'm not holding my breath for this year either but it would be nice.

My dp works over christmas, he can earn a whole weeks wages for doing xmas eve and xmas day, can't really turn it down.
The ds's are 4 and 2 yrs and don't really like the whole roast dinner thing so if we stay at home (don't go to my mums for the few days) I don't bother with a christmas dinner.
I might do some mango chutney coated chicken breasts with potatoes, veg and stuffing.
Need to get the xmas eve hamper sorted (new pj's for boys, a family fulm, so$me pop-corn etc) and their stockings which include a new outfit for the day, something to eat as breakfast happens after presents and a few crappy toys. My friend is giving me some wooden train tracks that her dsks don't ever play with so might load the stockings with that. Then I could get away with not wrapping it........

Just marking my spot . Definitely not into homemade Christmas stuff, tried making my own cards once - never again!

That said, I hate tinsel and tacky coloured lights too - all things tasteful in my house . So I'm somewhere between the two.

In our town, there is a Christmas shop that is open all year round. I might have to take my first (of many) visits there. Am starting to feel all Christmassy now, but have got the DCs birthdays to contend with first.

I do a combination of homemade and shop bought!

I make my own Christmas pud (easy) and Christmas cake (pain in the bottom) but Christmas dinner is provided by M&S!! I used to make my own with all sorts of posh vegetables from scratch but last year dd2 was only 5 wks so everyone chipped in to buy from M&S (notice how no else volunteered to cook ) and I will never go back to cooking dinner on Christmas day - it's rubbish being stuck in the kitchen for hours while everyone else has fun and you miss out on the children and their new toys as well! Much better to throw it in the oven and get back to the fun - and it tastes lovely as well!

Chirstmas dec's are multi coloured, tinsel rocks and tacky ceiling decs are a must!

I hate Xmas dinner....so I normally do something like a shoulder of lamb or a lasagne ( which I do make!)
I just can't get excited about it.

Made my 1st Christmas purchase today,vis a site a lovely MNetter posted for lovely cheap girlir stocking fillers for £1 and £2..I got 8 things for £12 [hwink]

Ooohhh, Lasagne, that's a good idea. Might go for that myself. And if dp doesn't like it and wants a roast, he can do it himself boxing day.

This is the thread for me , like lots of you fellow Christmas lovers I'm waiting for payday on Friday so I can finish shopping for the kids presents.

I'm getting so excited

I've bought all the DCs stuff. What I have to do now is stop looking, as I find myself adding to the pile... If I buy much more, I fear DH will divorce me. I've had a shit year, looking at toys is very cathartic. It's my therapy [hgrin].