Thread 2 - the one with a round of Santa-plause for all of the bargains

[Reastie]

Greetings and welcome one and all to a friendly and joyful corner of mn - the Christmas bargain thread. Here, we share Christmas present purchases, ideas, links and discount codes, with the aim to spread the Christmas magic and joy and reduce the financial stress.

It's a very busy thread, so see the tips below for helping everything run smoothly and avoiding repetitions of Cookiegate etc al. It's a lovely, friendly bunch and I'm so grateful to each and every one of you for building such a warm, fuzzy and generous spot on mn. I know I've save so much over the years and am so grateful to all of you for sharing.

Pull up a sleigh and relax with a mulled wine and mince pie, for Christmas has nearly arrived!

@ me if you need anything or you want to let me know anything - the thread moves so fast I can't always keep up so this really helps

A few pointers to make everyone’s life easier and the thread be as useful as possible:

• It’s handy to put in bold the bargains so they’re easy to spot
• No affiliate links
• No need to place mark or post messages of hello or thanks at the start of a new thread - use the ‘watch thread’ button
• Be nice or leave

The current referral thread for sharing referral codes https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/christmas/4940918-4940918-bargain-referrals-thread-6 . Please use this rather than this page to share referral links to make the sharing fair.

To make clicks links, you set it up like this only without any spaces apart from between the website and the word(s) you’re writing: www.bargainsahoyeveryonecomehere.co.uk

Thanks @RainbowZebraWarrior for the instructions below.
To make something bold, put this star * either side of the word you want to bold (with no spaces in between)

So starhellostar would look like this.

hello

Obviously use the * not the word star

Some of the below is copied and pasted from previous years, so do @ me if the links don't work

Stock informer is a handy site http://www.stockinformer.co.uk/default.aspx?fullsite=1

Camelcamelcamel is a great amazon price tracking tool http://uk.camelcamelcamel.com

The following links compare price products including postage
www.find-book.co.uk
www.find-cd.co.uk
www.find-dvd.co.uk
www.find-game.co.uk (as in PS4/xbox etc)

Amaryllis bulb from m&s and get your son to decorate a small plant pot with paint pens for it to go in.. We got one last year for an elderly neighbour and it was so beautiful when it bloomed and she was thrilled.
Or we bought the stained glass decorations from Hobbycraft this year and DS painted then for all the staff that worked with his class (9 Inc music teacher so it was a thoughtful but cheap option and also kept us occupied for a couple of evenings)

this Harry Potter trunk looks cute in the star gifts for £21.50
says it has butterbeer lip balm, bath fizzers, water bottle and notepad plus other bits, but doesn’t seem to be any pictures of the contents

Idea number 1 is to collect cash and put a voucher in a card. You can get vouchers that can be spent in a choice of shops and the teacher can get something they actually want.

Idea 2 is each parent buys a small gift and they are put together by you into some sort of hamper. So people could give food, drink, stationery, candles etc

Also think about other school staff who might not get recognised. So one year we collected £10 per parent in a class of 30. We gave a main present to the teacher, smaller gifts to each TA and boxes of chocolates for office and kitchen staff. If you go the hamper route you can ask that all staff involved in the class get to share the hamper and pick what they prefer from it. It also means parents can choose how much or little they wish to spend rather than being asked for a set donation.

I purchased this, it actually arrived badly damaged and in an ungiftable state. Boots have been terrible to deal with, I've had conflicting information by email to what's being said in store. It's put me off shopping with them again, I do have a lot of points saved up so I'll use them but won't spend any extra.
Also there's only 1 bath fizzer, the information online is misleading.

I agree, stuff I’ve had from boots has been packaged so willy nilly, it can’t be a proper warehouse can it.
some of it does get through unscathed but it’s definitely a roll of the dice

The last order I made a few weeks ago arrived with an open bottle of shampoo! It was a right mess. I thought it was a one off but then this arrived damaged. Their customer service are no help whatsoever and you effectively have to sort it yourself. This is infuriating enough but then store make out they can't help as it's a boots.com order. It takes several emails and trips to store to sort, I just haven't got the spare time or patience. There's definitely a lot of errors with how boots are being run. I wonder if the warehouse staff are disgruntled and making errors on purpose

Somebody asked for Miraculous Dolls before. They're now BOGOF at Smyths with some good rare ones! :)

Thanks for the whistlefish tip off, absolute bargain and feeling very organised for once to have all birthday and Christmas cards ready for the next few months.

Had a look at the Oliver bonas sale too and got some lovely things for my nieces. So thank you to the poster that linked to the hand warmers.

That was me! Thank you so much for this!

Can anyone help with the whistlefish codes please?

Thanx for everything so far!

On the offers section of the website it shows you the 15 cards for £10 offers etc and then if you sign up to their emails you’ll be sent a 20% off code too

Ooh thanks for Oliver bonas sale reminder! Very happily browsing 😊

Thank you. How are people getting it for £7 delivered. Is there a free delivery code?

I too have been a whistle fish sheep, so birthday cards and some Christmas cards sorted.

The Whistlefish 20% subscriber discount code didn’t work for me, it was removed when I went to process the payment - annoying. I’ve still done an order though as I’ve got a nice selection of cards - just hope the quality and size is good

A pp said the code was 545_INTRO for Whistlefish which worked for me when I tried it

@wholenutcadburys and anyone else thinking about teacher gifts. Teacher here and these are things I appreciate getting

• something decorated / made by the child
• nice handcream
• candles
• things for playground duty eg gloves, hand warmers, woolly hat, scarf
• anything stationery related
• nice notebooks / planners
• lip balms
• things like hyacinth bulb grown by child.
• books relevant to topics studied in class

-books relevant to interests the children know about.

I ordered a different gift set from boots and it also arrived badly damaged, they refused to exchange it or do anything about it so I left a review and they deleted it!! I got sent an email saying it wasn’t valid as it was about the condition of the item rather than the performance of it!

Someone in the previous thread linked to Molton Brown on qvc.

Molton Brown QVC

I got 4 body washes for £43.95 delivered with a £5 off discount code that came up on a banner.

They have no choice to at least take it back when you've bought it online, as you're protected from a consumer perspective.

Thank you so much for the Miraculous Dolls tip off. That's 4 bought for £35 delivered! Picked the two main characters a couple of odd ones which I'm sure DD will be delighted with.

Excellent 👌

The codes are for the items in the HOT DIAMONDS sale (look in the outlet section of the website:

SALE50 will get you an extra 50% off sale price and JEWELS stacks for free postage.

I wrote down the codes but not who posted them so thanks to whomever posted them originally!

Thank you@44PumpLane

Anyone after a bath bomb gift this cracker from Bomb cosmetics are pretty good and currently £6.33. bath bomb cracker