Has anyone seen any decent crackers anywhere? All seem to be the same here!

[JaneBirkin]

I've tried all the supermarkets and looked in town and so on...all the gifts seem to be the same with different packaging.

I'm not after anything terribly fancy but I would love to find some that have nicer gifts in them, not the generic plastic tat or the same-as-last-year silver coloured pen, golf tee and keyring, iyswim.

I'd be grateful for any ideas.

Have you tried Oxfam? They had really good crackers last year and the quality of the gifts was definitely the best of the informal test we did.

Achica had some nice crackers on the other day, not sure what was in them though.

Oh thanks that's some brill ideas to look at.

Have you thought of using a make your own kit? Art shops stock them plus plenty online.

The first Christmas our newly blended family spent together we got all 5 kids plus us making them. We all pulled a name out of a hat each and made a personalised cracker for that person complete with little gift.

we put in-

Lip balm
Glow stars for ceiling
miniature of whisky for Dad!
little pot of nail polish
decorated shoelaces
mini hand cream

it took an afternoon with the table covered in saved patterned paper, glitter, glue, feathers etc. You can buy little craft decorating kits with all this stuff in too.

Have you tried those musical crackers with musical tooters in and someone has to conduct eight of you in a carol? Var funny when noisy and wine-soaked.

I think M&S are doing 'Who Am I?' game crackers this year.

I prefer crackers with a game in rather than rubbish gifts.

OOh, fab reminder about Oxfam. I'm looking for crackers that fit kids and teens/ adults (some of whom i've never met on inlaws side so can't make my own) so decided I'll buy 2 packs - one for DD4 and DS7 who love any old tat (easy to find) and one nice one for the other 15!. Last year Oxfam's were lovely.

Also seen v lovely but expensive ones around but if you are like me and want to spend £10 or less, I've not seen much so will watch this thread

hmm, maybe I should review my budget actually. Reading that back it will be hard to find 15 'nice' ones for under ten pounds

John Lewis have wind-up penguins that you can all race

I get everyone to bring a homemade one. Rules:

1. must fit in a loo roll

2. max £1 present (poundshops, charity shops and car boot sales good for this)

3. Hat (usually swiped from work's xmas do)

4. Joke (googling cracker jokes is a great way to spend 30 mins)

5. Optional - has a 'bang'. Our local post office sells cracker snaps

The making your own idea is lovely. Thanks for all these ideas.

I looked at the Emma Bridgewater ones etc and I liked the look of the gifts in those, but they weren't available any more by the look of it on Achica.

I expect they will have them in TKMaxx again this year though, I think they did last year but I didn't look properly at them.

Looked at Oxfam but can't find any with nice presents inside - just the make your own snakes and ladders thing which tbh I don't like as much.

Oh I've found them now, the fair trade ones. They look quite nice.

Oh no - that's sooo disappointing about Oxfam! Last year they had leather gifts in them that we are still using - the keyring and fridge magnet were really lovely. (Seriously, I know that sounds unlikely, but they really were!)

these from the RNLI shop are expensive but good. We had some last year, and the gifts included mini-torches, pens etc.

bargain and fun

more expensive and good gifts
happy crackers

Some fun ones on Firebox.com