Christmas Archives - Mami To Five

Choosing Christmas gifts for men from Uncommon goods

Everyone loves a bit of shopping. I actually hate physically going to the shops but I can quite happily window shop on the internet for hours at a time, especially when I am looking to buy gifts for family and friends. One of the wonderful things about the internet is that you are now able to easily see what is available to buy, all across the globe. In theory this is fantastic, but quite often you are faced with a ‘we only ship to the continental united states’ Or ‘international shipping not available at this time’ which means you either a)need to find a similar product available in the UK, or b) need to know someone who lives in that country to borrow their address. But then you are effectively paying double the shipping costs and also putting someone else out.

I am always quite excited when I find a website that are happy to deliver goods to the UK so imagine how pleased I was when I was approached by the website Uncommon Goods to take a look at their website and not only was international shipping available but they also had the option to view prices in your own currency. So much easier than trying to figure out exchange rates!

I’m not sure if it’s just me but I usually find it particularly difficult choosing gifts for the men in my life. However whilst I was browsing I kept coming across things I thought Lee, or my dad, would love. In fact the entire selection of men’s gifts was quite broad and I expect you’d easily find something for even the fussiest of men.

Here’s a small selection of items I thought Lee would love this Christmas. He usually ends up with smellies, funny socks and a new video game or gadget. These things are all just a little bit different from the usual run of the mill gifts and vary in price from under £10 for the mug to £136 for the handmade, driftwood pen.

Having read into Uncommon Goods a little bit more I was quite impressed by the way they run their business. Not only do they strive to offer unique gifts for men, women and children (let’s just say they certainly live up to their name!) They also seem very ethically minded on the whole, with about one third of their products incorporating recycled or upcycled products. They also seem to appreciate the environment. They endeavour to supply products that are created in harmony with the envirnment without harming people, plants or animals, which in the plastic, throwaway age that we are currently in, is quite hard to come by.

I loved the fact that the artists of the handmade items have their photo right there next to the items they make, you can read a bit about them and the other items they make. This makes everything so much more personal for me and makes me feel that UncommonGoods actually care about their creators and employees. They don’t just mass import cheap products from China just so they can sell them for huge profit!

If you are looking for something that’s just a little bit different this Christmas I really do recommend you give Uncommon Goods a browse. You might just be pleasantly surprised!

This post was made in collaboration with Uncommon Goods, however all thoughts about the website and the products are honest and purely my own.

A Blogging Christmas Gift Swap

A few weeks ago myself and a group of bloggy friends got together and decided to do a Christmas gift swap. A bit of a Secret Santa. Well, I say secret, we actually knew who each other had, but until today none of us have known what anyone else sent to each other. This is actually the first real Secret Santa I have ever been a part of (besides a little one we did with the kids last year) so I was completely flummoxed trying to decide what to buy, while staying in the £5 limit.

The Ultimate Christmas Stocking for Tween/Teenage Girls

So here we have it, The ultimate tween/teen girl stocking fillers. I was actually dreading putting together this one as I was originally a bit stumped but I have actually given myself lot’s of great ideas of what I Santa can add to the girls Christmas stockings this year!

As I mentioned in my Stocking fillers for boys post we always have a few traditional items such as the orange and the chocolate coins so again pretend these are tucked nicely down in the toe of this stocking too!

Great Stocking Fillers for Boys

As I mentioned on Monday in my toddler stocking post I have a little series going on this week all about Christmas Stockings. This time we are on to the boys, especially those in the 8-10 age range. This age group can be REALLY hard to buy for. Most are ‘not really into toys anymore’ (even though they still happily play with the action men under the bed when their friends are not around!) yet they are still too young for ‘grown up’ teen/tween stuff. Here are the stocking fillers I have put together for this age group.

I already put the orange, the socks and the chocolate coins in the toddler one, so I won’t add them again, so just pretend they are there 😉

The ideal Toddler Christmas Stocking

This week, on the blog, is all about the humble stocking. We start off this mini series with the ideal toddler Christmas stocking. Toddlers can be quite hard to fill stockings for. Most typical stocking fillers aren’t suitable for the under 3’s due to small parts but I think I have put together an ideal stocking, with items small enough to fit, yet large enough not to be a hazard. They are also fun too!

Review ~ Sassy Bloom Box

A little while ago I was asked to review a Sassy Bloom Box. Now I had heard of these fantastic little boxes and had also seen some reviews so I was absolutely over the moon to be given this opportunity.

If you don’t know what a Sassy Bloom box is, in basic terms it is a subscription box service. But in reality it feels a little bit like Christmas once a month! When you sign up on the website, which can be for a one box off or a subscription, you fill in your child’s details such as age, gender and name. When your box arrives all the items inside have been chosen to be perfect for your child’s age and gender.

You can also get these lovely boxes tailored for those ladies in their 3rd trimester. So if you have a friend who is heavily pregnant (or you just want to spoil yourself!) you can also get a box with lots of goodies in. I think this would be an ideal leaving gift for a work colleague or if your child’s teacher were to go off on maternity leave. You would only need roughly £1 from each child’s parents and you have a fantastic leaving gift!

Christmas Traditions

So tomorrow is Christmas Eve! Baby O is completely oblivious to it all of course but the other four are so excited. They have written their lists, made their gingerbread houses and are now eagerly awaiting tomorrow so we can put up the tree!

Yes that is right, in a world where people are packing away the Halloween decorations and dragging out the Christmas ones at the same time my poor children have to wait until Christmas Eve to get theirs. Aren’t I an evil!

Actually if I’m honest, this is a Christmas tradition that we just happened upon, very unpleasantly, about nine years ago and it stuck. I even offer them every year to put it up earlier and they refuse, saying that this is the way they like it.

So how did it all start? Well….
I had the bright idea, in about November, that I wanted to rip all the wallpaper off in our living room and then redecorate. Of course we didn’t take into account that Christmas was fast approaching, things didn’t go quite as smoothly as they should have and with 3 little girls under 3 it wasn’t going to happen as fast as it necessarily should. So, it was literally Christmas eve when we were finally putting on the finishing touches.

Now for the unpleasant part. At around 5pm (after ALL the shops were closed) I went up to the attic to fetch the tree. Knowing it was right next to the hatch I only popped my head up and stuck my hand out to grab the box, luckily I grabbed the tree first as when I moved a piece of cloth about 3 dead rats went toppling out, it still sends shivers down my spine even thinking about it.

Let me tell you I nearly fell down that ladder with a screech! I slammed the hatch down and refused to go back for the decorations and so did hubby. It looked like a rat massacre with blood and bodies everywhere. Yuck. Now we do live in a 150 year old house in a valley surrounded by mountains and our back garden is the same level as our upstairs so rats and mice are always in people’s attics, unless they have been renovated. But never in my life had I seen anything like this. Even the rentokil guy was astounded at the sight!

Any who, onto the nice christmas tradition. We now had a tree, but no lights, no decorations and three little ones expecting Santa, so where was he going to put the gifts? After much ringing around I managed to beg and borrow some lights, tinsel and a few baubles. The girls woke on Christmas morning thinking the Elves had put up the tree, while Santa delivered the gifts. It was lovely. E&Ff had made their minds up that’s what had happened and who were we to spoil their fun?

It took quite a few years for me to tell them it wasn’t the elves but it had to be done, it was getting so hard and time consuming on Christmas eve waiting for them to go to sleep before I could start. But they were fine with it, they loved playing elves helping me decorate the tree. So now that is how we spend Christmas eve afternoon. But now I always check IN THE MORNING if everything is there and the lights work. Just in case!

Our other tradition is new pj’s. They love unwrapping them on Christmas Eve so we can all snuggle up with hot chocolate and a Christmas film.

Do you have any Christmas traditions? How did they start? I’d love to hear about them.