Last minute Christmas Presents

I spent Christmas feeling rather smug, I’d got all my christmas presents bought, they are wrapped and under my tree well before the big day. I’d also written out all my cards and posted those that need to go out, the others are sorted in to groups to be delivered next week. On top of all that I also had extra presents sorted. Extra presents, that does seem like a strange concept but I’ve discovered it is good to have a few generic presents wrapped for those surprise guests.

We’ve all been there, you think you know who it is your buying for each year and suddenly someone turns up on your doorstep with a present that you didn’t expect. If you have all your presents under the tree it can be a bit awkward to quickly tell them you haven’t wrapped theirs yet and will pop it around later, less so if they can see you haven’t many presents under there! So over the years I’ve developed a strategy for dealing with these unexpected Christmas visitors.

Now these may sound a bit boring but they are great generic presents. Throughout the year I tend to collect mugs, often I’ll find myself in a little village shop somewhere and they will have some mugs that I really like. Now my mug collection is very full because of this fascination and this is how my Christmas gift idea started. I had one on the side and someone turned up, in a panic I shoved some of the sweets I had made in to the mug and quickly wrapped it. Surprisingly they loved it and a tradition was born.

Now I keep about 4 or 5 mugs to one side filled with the sweets I have made for christmas just waiting for name tags to be popped on. These are great not only for my friends, but also kids friends or family friends, in fact anyone that has slipped your mind! But it is worth keeping a note of those who have bought you the present just so you don’t forget them the next year as they might get a bit suspicious if you give them a mug 5 years in a row!