The Festive Fivers competition is back!

meannab_2

Name of present: Personalized Calendar
Total cost: 4,87
Details: Personalized Calendar. You can upload your own photos, add/mark special dates (birthdays, anniversaries etc). You can get calendar for 1.01£ + 3.86 £shipping (it is slow option which takes up to 21 days, for faster 14 days option you will have to pay 5£). calendar looks really nice and is printed on nice glossy paper. Vistaprint does the offer, but at the moment I can't post the link.

claireyx_2

Name of present: Our Memory Book
Whether it's bought or homemade: mostly homemade!
Cost: around £4, for the photo album

I made this for my mum. I picked the photos of all our favourite memories then I wrote all about it from my point of view, funny things that happened, special memories I have as a child.
Then leave a page blank for the recipient to write their memories of that event/day.
It's amazing the things you don't realise the other remembers!

She always says it's her favourite present she has ever gotten, and always looks at it if she is feeling a bit low or down - it really cheers her up and usually ends up laughing remembering all the hilarious stuff we have done over the years!

WelshJennyWren

I think this is great for kids and adults alike. My family loves them.

Name of Present : Sweet Jars
Cost: £0.50-£5.00 (depending on what sweets you buy)
Details : You buy a small jar or use one you already have, there is a discount website called jam-jar dot com, £0.65p for a nice shaped one, but we all have jars around the house don't we. Buy a packet of sweets or chocolates from supermarket/sweet shop of your choosing, which ever is the favorite of the person you are giving the jar too. Place a nice off-cut of ribbon and a christmas tag tied around the neck of the jar, I make home made tags or use ones you have been given on presents, just cut off the half that has been written on.

Also for children, you can buy small glass bottles from the same website as above for £0.95p and you can fill them with colored fizzy pop or colored shower gel, again you can put a ribbon and christmas tag around the neck of the bottle. Kids will like these.:j

xfive71

Name of present: You are amazing because .......
Bought + homemade gift
Total cost: £4 + wrapping and decorations
Details:

I saw this nifty little affirmation frame at notonthehighstreet which I think is fab. But at £27 a pop it is a little expensive.

Buy a chunky frame and the paper mount from IKEA. The Ribba series are good. Print out your little message and cut down to size. Ideas such as :

• (Name of recipient), you are amazing because ..............
• I will always love you because ................
• Today is a better day because ................

Other stuff you can do :

• Pop a small trimmed photo of the little one at the corner of the frame and draw a speech bubble.
• Get the kiddies to write in their writing instead of printing the words

Write your message on the glass with a wipe-off pen. Pop the pen next to the frame and wrap the whole thing up. Not quite as polished but a lot cheaper!

NicNak247

Name of present: Ultimate Christmas Chocolate - Peppermint Bark
(bought then homemade)

http://littlecottonrabbits.typepad.co.uk/.a/6a00d83451d24769e20154385aeb54970c-popup


Total cost: Less than £5

Details: I bought this chocolate in America at Christmas a few years back (it was quite expensive) so I have been making it myself every Christmas since as it's cheap to make and very yummy. My friends and family love it. It really is the Ultimate Christmas Chocolate!!!

Ingredients:
Buy 3 x 100 grams of Milk Chocolate - £1.50 Asda chosen by you
Buy 3 x 100 grams of White Chocolate - £1.50 Asda chosen by you
1 box Asda peppermint candy canes £1.00 (only need half the box)
Peppermint Flavoring £0.84 (only need 2 teaspoons)

Directions:

Melt milk chocolate and pour into a baking tray lined with tin foil.
Cool in fridge and in the mean time crush candy canes.
Then melt the white chocolate add the peppermint drops and pour on top of the milk chocolate.
Sprinkle the crushed candy canes on the white chocolate.
Cool in the fridge for 30 mins. Once set, it's ready to cut or break and wrap up and give as gifts if you can manage not to eat it all!!

Enjoy

Link to recipe: http://www.inherkitchen.com/2010/12/01/peppermint-bark

Helping_Helen

Lollipop Christmas Tree
Homemade
Cost: Approx £4.00

Details: Buy a Styrofoamcone (£1.49 from Hobbycraft) and a couple of bags of lollipops (2 x £1 fromLidl).

Start at the top, make holes with a skewer, then pushlollipops into Styrofoam keeping a tree shape. Buy a bright flower pot or cover one with Christmas paper, stuff withpaper, polystyrene or oasis then glue the base of the cone onto it. I glued pompoms (poundland do bags of these)around base to anchor cone to pot, then twisted red and gold parcel ribbonthrough the lollies. Add a bow to thepot and you have it. There are lots ofvariations on this, you can put a round Styrofoam shape on a stick then glue onwrapped sweets, such as Quality Street.

Lillyann_2

Title: A Store of Stamps

Whether homemade or bought: Both

Total cost: £4.80

Details:

Design a card. On the inside of the front attach a narrower strip of card to serve as a pocket. On the inside of the back, attach 6 second class and 3 first class stamps (for presentation purposes - later they can be stored in the pocket).

Put this into an envelope and decorate it as a final touch.

Give this to someone who uses stamps and doesn't enjoy having to queue up in the post office. I would certainly appreciate it if it was given to me.

brianzebra

Name of present: Games Maker Surprise
Whether it's bought or homemade: Bit of both
Total cost: approx £5
Details (where it's from, how to make it etc):

Hubby was a games maker over the summer. So I am making a sponsors box which relates exactly to the work he did, including piccies of those he worked with in the media centre, a collage of those people he met ( Claire Baldin, Lord Coe, Gary Linekar, etc), pictures of Wenlock & Mandeville which my son will no doubt help me with. Also buying a bottle of coke, bar of cadburys, the cereal bar which he had hundreds of, I'll put in the pin badges (is that cheating that he has already had them lol?) and other little bits and bobs which will remind him of the fantastic times he had down there :j
A link to the offer if it's online (where possible): best link I can find... http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/datablog/2012/jul/19/london-2012-olympic-sponsors-list

Xxxlaineyxxx

Cost: under £5
Whether its bought or home made: bit of both!!
My partner loves having his favourite sweets for Christmas, so I usually buy the tubes but that works out as quite expensive for the amount you get in them. This year, I have paid £1.50 for a screw top 1.5l jar and got several bags of his favourite sweets when they were on promotion at half price (59p per bag!)
Sweets go in jar, lid goes on, then it's just a case of making a homemade label to tie around the neck of the jar. Cheap present and effort has gone into it too. Sorted!!

gayleygoo

Felted Cobweb Scarf

Cost £2-£4

Homemade

I recently made my first Cobweb scarf from wool tops (this is the unspun fluffy wool before it gets made into yarn.) You need 25-50g of wool tops depending on size of scarf - I made a small one which weighs 22g and a large one thats twice that. On ebay if you have a search for wool tops you should get a few options, one cost I got was 2x25g (two colours) for £3.50-ish delivered. Wingham Wool Works (their own site) sells 250g bags of mixed colours for £8 - you could make 5-10 scarves with this!

You use the roving along with some (hoarded) bubblewrap and netting (or net curtains), washing up liquid or bar soap, and plenty of rubbing and agitating. It can take a couple of hours, but if it's not too big you could get it down to an hour. You can embellish them with decrorative wool, or beads, ribbon and stitching. This makes lovely scarves and even beginners can make giftable creations - if it's a complete disaster you could make felt decorations or other gifts from it!

Add a homemade gift tag and wrap prettily in tissue paper or in a box (or both, why not?) and it will make a lovely, customisable, one of a kind present, for around £2

This is the tutorial I used. It's easier and faster than knitting and your hands will be SO clean once you've done all that felting.