1st of December hamper?

[Xmas2016]

What do you usually put in your 1st of December hamper?

Thank you

What the??

That's complete out of control, greedy, consumerist bollocks, if you don't mind me politely saying so

Oh balls. I haven't made the kids 27th October hampers. Presumably I'll be burned at the stake in the morning. Must try to remember the 7th November ones.

Don't get so absorbed that you forget to assemble and post my November the 9th treasure chest. Many thanks.

Right, we all need to do Christmas exactly the same. But no buying anything as that's consumerist. No food but potatoes as that's greedy.

So what are the rules?

One toy and a satsuma? If you don't like satsumas then it may be exchanged for a banana. No other choices are available.

Don't mention the C word until December 24th but you only get to say it 3 times. Be careful and don't waste those C words people!

Trees are allowed on Christmas Eve too. No tinsel - only flashy bastards have tinsel. We have standards to keep.

Now if you need me I'll be in Camping telling them how shit it is...

You're being weird blood.

By all means invent completely new and pointless gift giving days for the calendar, but you're just going to have to live with the fact it looks tacky, strange and wasteful to a lot of us.

Well this makes sense as an Advent idea, in terms of preparing for Xmas - making decorations etc. Also, the weather is like to be getting colder, so warm pyjamas etc. might be needed, and I'm looking for cosy onesies/ dressing gowns for them anyway. It might be nice to make that into something special, if one has the time and energy, not sure I do though!

I would really like a wood burner though, what was that about hygge?

oh, am looking for hot water bottles too

You CANNOT fit a wood burner into a blardy hamper

I'm sure I'd find aspects of your life I'd find tacky, wasteful and strange. Yet I wouldn't go onto a pleasant thread where you were posting happily about those things and tell you that.

I wouldn't feel the need to mock or insult you.

I'm obviously weird like that.

Mark my place to read later

I thought this was going to be a spoof thread tbh. Still adjusting to,the concept of Christmas Eve hampers and never heard of this one. I would not want to do both because there comes a time when things feel less special if they are happening all the time, but I appreciate others may feel differently. I think I would prefer to do December 1st actually, it doesn't merge into Christmas day and you have a month to enjoy the things. How about window stickers to decorate the house, you can get lovely white Christmassy ones and they peel off easily. Snowflakes etc.

I do it because there is so much cute Christmas stuff I want DD to use in the run up to Xmas. What's the point of getting say a Christmas jumper or mug on the 25th December.

Doorbell goes, DD will be all excited because Berry her elf will have arrived in his box (a sturdy gift box from Card Factory 4 years ago).

Berry will in it along with
Christmas jumper
Christmas cd (the same one every year)
Christmas DVD - Home Alone 1&2 this year
Some little Christmas nail stickers
Some chocolate
Her fabric advent calendar (same one every year since birth) new chocolate goes in each night for her to find in the morning.

And that's about it, nothing extravagant but draws out the excitement! I love it and my daughter's reaction to it! She genuinely still believes in Berry the Elf and Father Christmas and she won't forever so I'm enjoying whilst I can!

I'm not hugely fussed by other people's choices about how they celebrate xmas but I have noticed that there are a lot of xmas things cropping up now that are quite new. A few I can think of include:

• Breakfast with santa/elves/whoever
• 1st december hamper
• Expensive advent calendars (what happened to the £1.50 chocolate ones?!)
• big christmas trips/weekends away
• Elf on the shelf
• Xmas activities throughout december (crafts/gingerbread houses etc)
• Christmas eve hampers
• The actual day itself and all the presents/food/faff that goes with it

People will pick and choose which of these suit them and which don't and I think that's fine. But I agree that to do all/most of these things is a bit over the top and you run the risk of stuff being less special because it's just constant for the whole of december.

Like Baylisiana I also prefer the idea of an advent (1st dec) hamper rather than xmas eve as it spreads it out a bit more. But I personally wouldn't give random xmas themed presents like bath bombs as that's the kind of thing I'd give as a stocking filler. Instead I'd include the advent calendar, an activity book, maybe a xmas tree decoration, some little sweets and things like paper chains or snowflake making kit. I also don't think it should be an expensive thing because xmas day itself is expensive enough!

We do a festive breakfast on 1st December with pancakes and fruit in a candy cane shape.

The elf brings an advent calendar, a couple of crafts and fills the book shelf with our Christmas books.

I've usually finished my shopping by then so need something to keep me amused

Fgs. Advent calender gets dished out if I remember. Hang stocking up on Xmas eve. Lovely presents under tree on Xmas day. Have been a parent 22 years. Take my advice. Keep it simple.

Year 15 of parenting and have done the same every year;
Dec 1st. Advent calendars and Christmas bedding (used to be tartan before the cooler options), Decorations up weekend closest to this date.
Advent calendar is homemade and ranges from a chocolate coin or candy cane to Christmas jumpers and theatre tickets. All things we would have done anyway.

Dec 24th, Christmas eve hamper in the morning.

It does make sense to have a Christmas hamper before Christmas Eve thinking about it. I might switch to our elf bringing the hamper rather than leaving it when she goes....I can only cope with one hamper though.

We do have a box that comes out of the attic on the 30th of November, but it's the christmas books (which I don't like to see for the rest of the year!), the advent calendar and some christmassy scented candles. Also the christmas CDs though we don't really use them any more as we have them all on usb sticks now.

We don't hamperify it, though, it's the same stuff every year and that would make a bigger deal of it than it is.

I don't do christmas eve hampers. The kids get new jammies (which they'll use for the rest of the winter anyway) and we'll watch a christmas movie on netflix.

I WILL NOT DO ELF ON THE SHELF. EVER.

Everyone else can knock themselves out doing whatever they like, it adds to my festive happies to know that everyone else is having fun too, in whatever way suits them.

This is great - I call mine an advent box and had a thread asking for ideas a couple of days ago.
Can't possibly link it as I wouldn't have a clue how to do that but this thread has so many replies - mine only had a couple! Probably because no one has any idea what an advent box is!. I Shall now call it a hamper!
Anyway some lovely ideas here - cards for classmates is genius!
I don't do a box/hamper on Christmas eve.

We have a basket that lives in the loft most of the year, it will be coming down tomorrow as we use it to hand out sweets for trick or treaters, we used to use it for handing out party bags when the DCs were younger and it is used as the Advent hamper (I like that name better than 1st Dec hamper too).