Christmas on a tight budget...... tips & ideas

[M2T]

Well folks, that time of year again.

I absolutely HATE the fact that some people are still paying off the Chrsitmas debt in JUNE! Totally unnecessary and a lot to do with marketing pressure.... this idea of what we SHOULD be buying our kids at Christmas and what we SHOULD decorate our house with and eat.

So how about all you Mumsnetters post your fab tips and suggestions on how to make Christmas special and magical without spending more than £50! I'm sure there must be lots of good ideas floating around.

Im thinking of giving a lot of people gifts from photos of the children (Mugs for Grandmas, calendar etc) but do you think these pressies are REALLY appreciated or do they think "ehhh thanks your kids are cute but did I really need a mug with their mugs on would have rather had choccies or wine"

Awww, Twiglett got there before me - I was just about to post that link!

Fairydust's photo suggestion was a good one - but save even more money by taking the piccies yourself.

Love the tampon thing! They would make lovely pressies too (to some unsuspecting relative!). My ds has tried to clean his ears out with one of mine - good job his ears aren't very big and wrapping was still on!

Make a deal in advance with friends and rellies not to give presents at all - just cards and good wishes. Everyone (IMO) would rather spend the cash on themselves. If they are gift addicts set a spending limit - eg £5. Take each other out for a drink instead (not you, Ms Preggers )
Don't buy pointless crap is my other tip. Though whether I can stick to this when I've already brainwashed ds (2) into a state of feverish pre-Xmas excitement, I don't know.

When dd1 was about 3 we had a christmas where we were incredibly skint - I usually spend a fair amount on my mum for a pressie but simply couldn't afford it, so I made a video of dd1 instead, loads of clips of her doing different stuff, playing, dancing about, waving and laughing etc and put it to music - Angels by Robbie Williams - well, my mum rang me on christmas morning sobbing down the phone - she couldn't speak, so I cried too, and it was one of those warm-inside moments. Presents needn't cost much at all.

fpr years now, myslef and my sisters spend £5 pund on each other and have the challenge of having to by as many silly things as you can...takes a bit of time though!
i works for us!

There's a lovely thread somewhere about buying cheap/reject/second-hand china and getting the children to paint them for presents using porcelain paints (which aren't cheap but would cover a lot of plates). I'm going to try that next year.

I'm sure everyone does this, but it's really worth checking the supermarket shelves for things like own-brand Brio. You can get a BIG train set in our local Tesco's for under £20. OK, so that makes a big hole in £50 but if you do want to splash out you get a lot of train for your money. And there are smaller ones too.

Does anyone have a decent biscuit recipe to try out any of the bikkie ideas?

This thread is great! We make a lot of presents ourselves (or rather I do) and they go down very well. But you do have to be organised in advance. In autumn we go out picking blackberries and sloes, even rosehips sometimes, and this is something the kids help with. One year we had a picnic in the park with dd1's friends, gave each one a tupperware box and asked them to fill it with sloes. I also use fruit from friends' trees etc when they have a glut.

Then I get to work making chutney, jam, country wines and sloe gin. This all keeps well and is put away for Christmas. I sometimes do olive oil flavoured with chilis, garlic and herbs, or pickled onions, marmalade etc. This year I am in the process of making some wine vinegar (from homemade wine) - this in turn can be used to pickle onions or something, or flavoured with herbs or garlic etc.

The rest of the ingredients for these things don't cost the earth, the gin for the sloe gin is the most expensive thing, but you can use the cheapest as it is all flavoured anyway with the sloes.

I usually have a big Christmas cake made in Sept or Oct, put away to mature and then cut it up in Dec and ice as smaller individual cakes. At the last minute I bake cookies and sweets.

Then I make hampers out of all this stuff using any nice baskets I might have recycled from peoples' gifts to me, or even found at a carboot. DD1 makes me labels for everything on the computer, and we and other people save bottles and jars throughout the year. Plastic supermarket trays which might have contained fruit or veg can be used, lined with some tissue paper, scaps of fabric or any straw-type packaging material you have reserved from a gift received (I'm an awful squirrel for such things).

It has got to the stage where I receive messages that so and so would love some more of that sloe gin, or will I be making pickled onions this year?

The great thing is that a lot of it can be done months in advance, and then when December arrives and everyone is rushing about shopping, I often find I have catered for most of the people on my list already. I also don't have to spend hours with wrapping paper and sellotape.

Well I made great bekkies yesterday for the tree, It is Nigella recipe and it is really nice and spicy (I wouldn't do the boiled sweet thingy with them though) I'll write up the recipe tonight, although asearch may reveal it, I remember someone posting it last year.

Last year I made chutney, mincemeat and jams, but I have to say the jam jars were so difficult to track down, I hadn't been saving them all year, that I reckon I spent a fortune.

This year I did the painted plates, they look so cute and cost £2 per mug and £1.50 per plate, my poor children thought they were on a production line.

Where did you get the paints?

Check the Pebeo webite I think it is www.pebeo.com and then stockist info, it will give you the nearest place for you. You are looking for the porcelain 150 paint range.

Haven't read all the replies but we're making some / most of our decorations out of stale bread cut the shapes out then leave bread to go dry over night then paint and glitter using a mix of pva to stop the bread going mouldy.

twiglett - have you made your angel yet?

We're having a present amnesty amongst all our mates. No presents for anyone but a meal together with kids with everyone bringing something to the feast. I had to go to Oxford Street on Saturday for something else and the orgy of consumerism just revolted me. Christmas should be about being happy with those you love, making sure that they know how special they are to you, not a bloody orgy of spending money we don't have on stuff other people don't want. (sorry for rant but it's really hit me this year)

I've really enjoyed reading all your ideas posted here. Over the last few years I've become increasingly dismayed by the consumer-fest that Christmas has become. Dh says I'm really bah-humbuggy about it, but I cannot understand why we get ourselves into so much debt over just one day. For my family, we're doing 'Secret Santa' this year ie. put everyone's name in a hat and each person picks one name and buys a gift for that person (limit applies, and it's much more fun if it's set at £5 or £10). It does help keep down the cost. Last year's theme was home-made presents. Dh and I spent several evenings making fudge and truffles, wrapping them in coloured cellophane (you can buy it from florists) and making little gift boxes. Would have liked to do the same again this year, but due to some epic DIY projects going on in the family, time is limited (and kitchens non-existent in some cases).

HZL, or anyone else really, I am struggling to find a simple chocolate truffle recipe where the truffles can be eaten up to ten days after making them. Can anyone help? the plan is for ds and I to make loads to give to his childminder, teachers, local child friendly shop keepers etc. I've checked deliaonline but they have to be eaten within three days!

BTW - I think it is relevant on this thread as I think they will work out a lot cheaper than shop bought ones.

Sis, not sure about how long they keep for, but I have got a really nice recipe book "Vegetarian Christmas" by Rose Elliott with those type of recipes. Surely they would keep in the fridge? There is a funny article about being stingy at Xmas in the Guardian
money.guardian.co.uk/smartspendingforchristmas/story/0,11127,1097072,00.html There was also a nice article in Oprah's magazine saying you should ask yourself about every Xmas task whether you are doing it to make someone else happy (in which case check if you still think they deserve it) or to satisfy an expectation which you have imposed on yourself (in which case ditch and just do what you feel like). I did all my cards electronically for a few years from a US website, but now I have realized that most of the people don't bother sending me one anyway, and so I am not sending any, except to long-lost friends who live far away and I want to contact once a year.

Sis, there's a recipe in one of dd's Usborne books for truffles which need to be eaten within 5 days, but as they don't have cream in I imagine they would be ok for at least a week.

Let me know if you want it (trying to reduce Mumsnet talk time at the moment so only want to type it in if it'll be of use !)

sis - truffles can be frozen very successfully so just make any recipe and freeze now. Take out of the freezer the night before you want to give them. If the recipe says dust icing sugar over the top then leave this till after they've frozen cos it just disappears. I'll have a look at my recipes later. I think the ones with raisins and crushed biscuits keep well.

Thanks Outofpractice, Twink and Eulalia, I went to the library last night and got a Rose Elliott recipe which says nothing about eating within a couple of days so I will go with that one. Also had a fudge recipe so I may try that as well.

The freezing sounds great Eulalia. Could you freeze fudge?

Anyone who keeps either fudge or truffles long enough to freeze is amazing IMO.

definitely agree in the present anmesty thing when you have older children. My 9 year old now wants such specific things and they are usually quite expensive too.

If you can't get to boot sales for secondhand toys, pound shops are great for stocking fillers - lots of bargain toys and stationary. Also discounted book shops. Lidl is good for chocolate novelty fillers as well. I have set very strict limits on stocking fillers this year.

I was going to add that home made sloe gin is a good present. We made some in September and it was going to be a christmas present for MIL and PIL. However dh and I have been - ahem - testing it rather a lot recently and only half of it is left.

Truffles wouldn't last long in our house either.