Gift Ideas for the Man Who Has Everything

September 23, 2021September 23, 2021 Jayne1 Comment

I don’t know about you, but I generally find the men in my life the trickiest to buy for. Whether it’s my 13 year old nephew, my Dad or my Grandad, they always bamboozle me when it comes to gift buying. This year, I’ve started doing my research well ahead of the holidays and I thought I’d share some of the gift ideas I found. There are options from the super high-end (and out of my budget!) to the cheaper but more meaningful, so cost won’t be an issue.

Super High End – Golf Holidays in Spain

If you’ve got a man in your life who loves to golf and money is no object then there are some fabulous options for Golf Holidays in Spain which will be the best gift they’ve ever received! There are packages which include accomodation, meals and green fees to the best golf courses included, meaning that they just need to remember to pack their clubs and some undies and they’re pretty much set! Gift ideas don’t come much swankier than this!

High End – Vintage Watches

Husband is an absolute sucker for a good watch, and while I would never be able to afford some of the ones that he lusts after (we’re talking TENS of thousands of pounds in some cases 😱) there are some beautiful restored vintage watches out there which come in at a much more reasonable price. If it’s a special occasion like a birthday or anniversary, you could even try to find a watch from their year of birth or the year you got married to make it even more poignant and special.

Middle of the Road – Aftershave

In the past, aftershave used to be a reasonably priced gift to give for a special occasion. These days, many of the most popular fragrances for men, such as Creed Aventus, carry prices tags which are closer to the £150-£200 mark, making them a far less affordable option. However, if you CAN afford it, they make a fantastci gift and the price tag does mean that the grangrances are super strong and will last for a really long time.

Affordable – Magazine Subscription

Magazine subscriptions are something that Husband has really enjoyed as a gift in the past. He’s a lifelong cyclist, so last year my Mum got him a subscription to MBUK for his birthday, and getting his copy through the door once a month was a real highlight. The beauty of a subscription is that it lasts for 6 months or a year, so it’s the gift that keeps on giving, and the costs isn’t usually unaffordable. There are mags out there that appeal to a huge variety of interests, so you can really personalise your choice.

Free – Get Crafty!

There have been a few birthdays over the years when I’ve been a bit skint and to be honest, Husband doesn’t like people spending loads on flashy gifts for him anyway. What he HAS enjoyed in the past is when I’ve made him something special, such as a collage of photos from our 16 years together, cooked him is favourite meal, or even done crafts with the kids that he can treasure as a keepsake. It really is the thought that counts and if you use your imagination to find some cheap or free gift ideas, the homemade gifts are often the very best.

Gift Ideas

Handmade Gifts for all the Family

June 15, 2020April 27, 2021 Jayne1 Comment

Whether you’re gifting for father’s day, a significant wedding anniversary, a birthday, or just because, everyone loves receiving handmade gifts, nothing shows love more than a thoughtful gift created by some of the smallest members of your family. Grandparents and great grandparents especially love receiving these gifts all year round! If they no longer live locally, sending these surprises in the post just shows them how much you’re all thinking of them, and if you have elderly family residing in care homes, these gifts can be perfect for decorating their space!

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Paintings

One of the simplest but most fulfilling activities for your children is painting; they love the experience and family love seeing the results! For younger children, try thick-handled paintbrushes to help them learn to hold the brushes and create mini masterpieces. For older children, provide them with items to print with, so they can experiment with different textures and the print it creates. For families with gardens, get your children to paint large stones with acrylic paints to gift as decorations for yards or windowsills.

Mugs

Everyone has a cupboard filled to the brim with cups, but gift your family members with their new favorite mug! You can get your children to create a design onto the mug with ceramic paints to create a masterpiece that will last a lifetime or have photos printed onto the cup so they can see their grandchildren every time they have a drink. If you need some artwork to place on your design, there’s some great Mother’s Day clipart out there which is free to use.

Baking

Perfect with a cup of tea or coffee, everyone loves home-baked cupcakes, muffins, or cookies. Let your child decorate their baking with chocolate buttons, sprinkles, and icing!

Salt dough handprints

These are brilliant gifts to capture your little one’s handprint to gift on an ornament to your loved one. Roll out your salt dough and cut out circles, then have your child print their hand in the mixture. It can take a couple of days to dry thoroughly but you can then finish the project by painting the handprint with acrylic paints. These handprints make perfect paperweights! You can also create a little card to go with your handprints to show the age your child was when they made it, and add some Father’s Day clipart to make it extra special.

Key chains

A brilliant and inexpensive gift is to make key chains – we all use our keys every day, and this is a sure-fire way of bringing a smile to your family’s faces every time they open the front door. You can purchase rings relatively cheaply online and then let your children decorate string with beads. For younger children, any variety of color and textured beads will let their imagination go wild, for older children, purchase letter beads to let them spell out messages for their loved ones.

Lastly, enjoy the design process with your child. Any handmade gifts will let your loved one know you’re thinking of them, no matter how simple the design, or small the project, this is a definite way of bringing a smile to someone’s face.

Crafts

Unique Teacher Gift Idea

July 18, 2016July 23, 2016 JayneLeave a comment

It’s that time of year when everyone’s thoughts are turning to gifts for teachers, the angels who’ve dealt with our kids for the past ten months! Sausage always likes to do something totally different, which means that the standard ‘box of choc or bottle of wine’ are totally out of the question. Pinterest is our FRIEND! Something Sausage like the look of this year was a personalised name plate for her teacher’s desk, something like this:

Acrylic Teacher Gift

Always ones to share the wealth, we thought we’d give you a little guide to how something like this can be made cheaply and effectively.

Find somewhere online which sells cut-to-size acrylic and order a piece which is roughly 12″ x 4″ x 2″, plus a piece for the base which is slightly larger and flatter.
Use a hot glue gun to glue the two pieces together so that the flat piece acts as a base and allow to dry thoroughly.
Use chalk pens to write your teacher’s name on the front, and use contrasting colours to create a swirl pattern around it.

And that’s it, it really is THAT simple! I have a lot of friends who are teachers and they all say that the gifts they love the most at the end of the year are the ones which are home made or personalised in some way. Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure they also love the odd bottle of wine and box of chocs, but there’s only SO much boozing and eating you can do in one summer!

Are you handmaking your child’s teacher gift this year? If so, I’d love to see what you’ve made or what you’re planning to make so either leave me a comment below of find me on Facebook and leave me a photo on the Mum’s the Word Facebook page. Thanks for reading!

Crafts · Family · Holidays · Kids

How to Make a Paper Fortune Teller (video)

July 18, 2016July 18, 2016 JayneLeave a comment

Paper Fortune Teller
Sausage and Burrito Baby are lucky to have an amazing relationship with my mother-in-law, who really is a truly awesome Nan to them both. They love spending time at Nanny’s house, not least of all because she has loads of toys and craft stuff set up for them to use. Sausage often sits there for hours with Nanny’s selections of paper, pens, glue, tape and other bits, happily making wonderful creations which she gives to us as gifts. One thing she LOVES to make is a paper fortune teller, something that I also loved when I was a kid too, although she can’t seem to remember how to fold them herself, so that responsibility always falls to me.

On Saturday, we went to MIL’s for the afternoon as we so often do, and Sausage wanted to make a fortune teller and I decided to get her to record me making one so that she could watch the video next time and make it for yourself, but it gave me the idea to share it here! I hope you find it useful…

How to make a paper fortune teller

Sausage uses a whole load of different “fortunes” on hers; for instance, one of these ones she used as a “which Pokemon trainer would you be”! It gives kids more hours of fun that you’d ever think a single sheet of paper could, allows them to be creative and is just a really sweet, simple little activity which can be done anywhere AND reduces screen time.

They’re also really good for helping with spelling; sometimes, instead of writing a colour on the outside, Sausage will do a blob of the corresponding colour which means that she has to remember the spelling of the word every time she does a fortune. Simple enough, you might think, but making them use colours like “turquoise” can really take it up a notch!

Do your little people know how to make fortune tellers? Is it something you’ve passed down to them from your own childhood? What do yours write inside their fortune tellers? Leave me a comment below, I’d love to hear from you!

Crafts · Crowdsourced

Our Favourite Halloween Crafts

October 26, 2015 Jayne4 Comments

Sausage is a huge fan of Halloween. In fact, just the other day, she told me that Halloween was actually her favourite, ahead of Christmas; if a kid chooses something ahead of a holiday which involves copious amounts of presents, you know it’s serious! I do my best to indulge her love of Halloween with costumes and pumpkins and a yearly viewing of Ghostbusters, but this year the goalposts have changed. This year, we’re living in a village which actually DOES STUFF for Halloween!

On Saturday evening, we’ll pop over to the other half of the village to meet in the Mission Hall. From there we’ll indulge in a supper of hot dogs before all the families go trick or treating together! Sausage is beside herself with excitement as we’ve never done trick or treating before. Houses who wish to be involved are to place a pumpkin outside, so we thought we’d go one step further and make some awesome Halloween crafts for our display, and we’ve been searching blogs for inspiration. Here are our favourites:

These glowing ghosts over at Adventures of Adam are so simple, yet wonderfully effective and would make a lovely window display for Halloween night.

These tissue paper pumpkins from Parenthood Highs and Lows are wonderfully easy to make and look fab, and I reckon even Burrito Baby could get involved with making them.

As someone with a Pokemon FANATIC as a daughter, I know for a fact that we’ll be making this at some point this week! Go to In The Playroom for full instructions.

Another craft which would look fantastic as part of a window display and is super simple to do are these clothes peg mummies from Thinly Spread. Their googly eyes and wavy arms don’t make them look too scary, making them perfect for toddlers and little ones.

If you’re looking for some fun, spooky treats to give out to Trick or Treaters, these brilliant spider cakes from Pink Oddy are just the thing and they’re great fun for the kids to make, too.

We love a bit of bunting in our house and this super-simple Halloween version from Daisies and Pie is a great addition to any Halloween house, especially if you’re throwing a party.

I’ve been wanting to make these Jelly Worms for ages as they make the perfect gruesome Halloween sweets, but I’ve never got around to it. Luckily, The Gingerbread House has a great tutorial to help you make your own.

These lanterns would be the perfect accompaniment to Trick or Treating, especially if you used battery powered tealights or glowsticks, as the tutorial from Mum in the Madhouse suggests.

These sugar skull dolls from Zing Zing Tree could not be more appropriate for us this year as Sausage is going to be dressed as a real-life Day of the Dead Senorita this year, so these will definitely be being made by us!

Sausage and I were a bit late to the Hama beading party but now we’ve discovered them, we’re massive fans. This spooky glow-in-the-dark Hama craft from Hannah Spannah would be brilliant to hang in windows or on gate posts on the night itself.

If you have a little one (or even yourself) who isn’t keen on the full dress-up experience, then these autumnal Halloween masks from Dilly Drops could be the perfect solution.

Finally, these pop-up ghosts from Diary of a First Child make a really gentle ‘trick’ if people aren’t in the giving mood but you don’t want to go full-on and egg people’s houses! People will find it so adorable that they’re bound to muster up a treat after seeing them!

What will you be making this week?