Already started thinking of the festive season?! Want to? Share your top tips to beat Christmas stress with Lidl: chances to win vouchers NOW CLOSED

[EmmaMumsnet]

We KNOW it's early but lots of you (and Lidl) are already thinking ahead to December and we're sure MNers have a whole wealth of fab Christmassy tips to share. As great as Christmas is, we know it often comes with a world of stress, whether that's the pressure of entertaining, avoiding cooking disasters, or managing it all on a tight budget! So please share your top tips for beating these battles.

Tell us what do you do to ease the stress of Christmas? Is it the art of preparing early, finding those great value-wins or quick cheats like great tasting and great priced party food?

Add your tips to this thread and you will be entered into a prize draw where 5 MNers will each win a £50 Lidl voucher.

Thanks and Happy Christmas

Standard Insight T&Cs Apply

I am not bothered if early Christmas talk offends anyone it's my favourite time of year and gets me through the horrendous other parts eg chronic pain condition so....
End of August I pick new stationary eg book and pen and make a list.
Everyone has one large Gift from Father Christmas.
I make stockings for five children various adults. They may or may not be themed.
Christmas Eve box to organise.
I buy at least two or three bits - even if it's socks or pants- every week until first week of December.
I save all year round into savings pot so food and presents are paid for.
I don't go overboard with the grub. Normal roast and a few things I wouldn't normally buy or we end up with a surplus.
I just like it..... It makes me happy :)

We head to my parents! They love having us there, so there's loads of food, loads of people to entertain the children, and a huge big tree and roaring fires...
The only stressful bit is the journey there! Oh, and sorting presents for four kids and all the relatives etc ...

We like to get nice food in, a little more of everything than normal because of more people to cater for. I try to have leftovers I can mainly freeze for another time. Make sure you are going to want to eat them. If having cream with a pudding, have clotted cream as you can freeze it if you buy too much. Also, if you get the twitch about extra crisps, chocolate biscuits, juice and soft drinks, buy multipacks of individual packets/cartons/cans. You can bring them out if you need them but if not you can use them up for packed lunches.

Don't start planning your first Christmas meal by reading Delia two weeks before Xmas. When you think you've been organised she'll send you into a panic by telling you to start at least 3 months ahead!

I do as much as possible in advance. Fill the freezer with food bargains and plan everything well in advance. I have all the family round for Christmas lunch so I delegate some of the time consuming stuff like the Christmas pudding and ab alternative dessert.

My top tips are

To save money use lidl alcohol : there version of baileys for example is better than the original in my opinion

Use short cuts like buying freezer already chopped onion and garlic to go in things like stuffing

Buy ready made bread sauce that you can heat up in the microwave

Make a note of what worked well last year and what didn't as soon as Boxing Day arrives

Stock up in January sales on stuff like cards & wrapping paper and then make a note in new diary on 1st December page where you've put it !

If you've got a large family and they're all coming to you then everyone has to bring a dish eg great Aunty enuf brings trifle for Boxing Day pudding , mil brings red cabbage for Xmas day lunch , Uncle Ned brings lager etc

Don't do everything alone , 'oh I'm just going to wash up ' complete silence ' please can you give me a hand uncle Ned' don't be a martyr !

Don't try to recreate some mythical Holywood perfection.

Create your own traditions, rather than slavishly following others'. Accept that these traditions may well evolve as the dc grow older.

Lists: to do/done, to buy/bought, to think about.

The freezer is your friend!

Dh and I decide menus together, I generally do all the shopping and prep, he does the actual cooking on the day.

Slowcooker has got to be my favourite thing! it makes the food good and its relatively easy effort so i'm allowed to get distracted by all the excitement and not spoil christmas dinner!

I have a present cupboard which is pretty much full of things we get in the sale as I have lots of children to buy for and it always seems to be a birthday or Christmas. Adults I do pick up bargains throughout the year but mainly start in October because of storage space.
I make the Christmas cake and pudding early in December and buy a frozen joint of meat in November just in case. On Christmas Eve we normall pop out to M&S and try and get something half price, if not I'll get the other joint out of the freezer. Everything is cooked from scratch etc for maybe frozen Yorkshire puddings but there s no set time for dinner, normally 2ish but if it's later or earlier it's no big deal as we do stockings first.

Shitwithsugaron

I use a Christmas app ingeniously titled "Manage Christmas".

It's red, got a pic of a white box on and it's password protected. I can put in a budget per person and it calculates how much money I've got left. Also you can put in ideas, and then state whether item has been bought and wrapped. It's great, I love it!

Christmas seems a whole lot bigger deal now I've got kids, and the temptation is to go overboard but really it's only one day and they don't need all that much stuff. Having said that, I try to buy stuff for Christmas presents rather than just giving it to them for no reason through the year, then they have to think about what they really want rather than just asking for everything. When it comes to the shopping I'm a fan of lists, lists and more lists, or I'll end up with 3 presents for my mum and none for my sister or some other disaster!

With 10 nieces and nephews to buy for I usually just buy tickets to a panto as their present and we make a day of it. I love getting to see them enjoy it and hate the madness of wrapping paper flying everywhere and not knowing who got what. So far they've all been happy and it's a day to look forward to

I like to plan for Christmas so that I can relax on the actual day.

I always make a starter and dessert that can be made the day before, or at least just needs assembling on the day. For the main I use frozen roast potatoes and mash (I can't be doing with a steamy kitchen when i've got make up on and made an effort with my hair). I always put the food in serving dishes rather than straight on the plates. less waste and everyone can have what they like and leave what they don't. Anything left over in the serving dishes that's worth saving is easily covered for snacking on later.

For gift wrapping, I use rolls of plain one coloured paper cut to size and jazz them up with real ribbons that I buy cheaply in bulk. Amazon sell mixed bags of ribbons for a few pounds and there's usually enough for Christmas and birthdays throughout the year. It makes my bargain presents look more expensive.

Make a list of gift ideas now! Buy as much in advance as possible - I aim to have it all done by the of first weekend in December , and sorry lidl, order food on line to avoid the supermarkets on the days before Christmas!

Start planning early - I have already lurked on the Christmas gift ideas thread and started writing lists. I have loads of people to buy for and it stresses me out if I feel unorganised so preparation is key to a happy and relaxed ponygirl!

I start planning early, in fact I usually get bargains in the January sales for the following year! Lots of lists and I delegate tasks on the actual day.

My main tip to reduce stress is to remember that it's just a fancy roast dinner!

My top tip for avoiding Xmas stress is to completely ignore Xmas and treat it like any other day, something me and my husband have been doing for several years now.
We've saved loads of money too.
Family and friends get nice gifts on their birthdays and when my son was younger if he wanted something I'd get it for him during the year finances permitting.
He doesn't do it now he's grown up either, thinks it's a total waste of time.

I start buying in the January sales and buy wrapping paper, cards and tags for the next Christmas.

I buy throughout the year to prevent loads of stress and a massive bill in December and aim to be finished by the end of November. All purchases are logged using a present buying app so that I can keep track of who I have bought for and how much I have spent.

From September I start buying extra goodies to put away for Christmas in my food shop to lighten the grocery spend.

Wrapping waits until December so that I can wrap them under the lit tree whilst listening to Christmas music.

When I became a Mum suddenly I wasn't just responsible for a new human...I was also responsible for making Christmas as magical as mine were!! So...I looked back on what made those Christmasses special and it wasn't the meals...the presents or any of those specifics. It was being with family. So that's what I focus my Christmas planning on. My tips:

Don't look at Christmas as just one day...it's a whole festive season. spread everything out and don't try to cram it all into a short amount of time...people get ratty and tired!

I have a December calendar with activities planned on. As local events post dates, I pop them on this calendar and we always do something special on every day in December. Baking gingerbread, walking around the village to look at the lights...it doesn't have to be big but it's focused around family.

On the big day, again I get family involved. I have a list of jobs that I would be happy for other people to help with. Everyone always offers to help and I can dish out jobs easily knowing that I won't be worrying if it's done how I would do it....it means that there are loads of us in the kitchen, peeling veg and drinking port :) I love it!

My final tip is to not schedule timings...for anything. It adds pressure and means people clock watch waiting for the next meal etc.

Oh and do the little things! empty bins, make sure there's enough loo roll, get cold medicine in...boxes of tissues, spare batteries, washing up liquid and soap.

But..enjoy it and focus on what makes it special :)

We update decorations in one area each year. Last year we decked the hall (literally) and this year it's outside lights. It means we really focus on getting it right, and it's new and exciting, with the balance of the old familiar decorations in the rest of the house.

We make a really big deal about decorating. The first weekend in December we put the tree up, have our first snowballs, and make a trial Christmas dinner. We test anything new we want to add to Christmas dinner (last year we bought most things from Lidl for the first time so we wanted to check it was right for us). We aim to have most of the shopping done by this weekend and we wrap loads while watching Christmas films.

Drinking, wrapping, Christmas films and twinkle lights going. I actually like that weekend more than Christmas Day.

If you have a toddler who is likely to try and strip the tree, set up a toy tree for them. I am making a felt tree with felt Decorations that my toddler can put up and take down over and over again.

Of course the breakable baubles will still be high up on the real tree too, in case she still tries to do it over!

Christmas has become easier as the years have flown by and family members have passed on. Since I stopped buying for work colleagues I now only buy pressents for 10 people, and I try to pick things up as I see them throughout the year. I don't have to bother with food shopping as we go to my in-laws for meals.
Having said that I am usually still on a last-minute rush picking up prezzies for the awkward people and I hate writing Christmas cards, intending to write them mid November and putting it off till last posting day (thank goodness for definite deadlines) and sometimes Christmas eve if given out by hand!

I start knitting in the spring with the best of intentions, forget,v then panic knit like a mad woman from about now onwards

Apart from that, my top tips are to buy cake ingredients early, always have a stash of posh chocolates for last minute "I forgot all about them!!", and pick up random kitschy trinkets throughout the year to make eclectic stocking fillers!