For the aspiring chef on your Christmas list, ideas aren’t always easy to come by, especially if you don’t live with them to know what they have. However, even if you live with the chef, you might need a little help with ideas.
I love to cook, so I appreciate getting the latest and greatest tools and products that are available on the market. So, I have come up with some ideas to help those who are looking for a little inspiration.
It’s that time of year again when you have to put your thinking cap on. What presents to get your friends and family for Christmas? Well, we have put together a list of our top 7 presents for those who are at the cutting edge of design. Some are quirky and some are useful, and one is a design classic.
It’s that time of year… again. The Christmas holiday will be upon the world soon. And with so much to wrap-up at the end of the year, Christmas shopping can be even more of a hassle. With scores of shoppers crowding the malls and tens of thousands logging onto the Internet, there are many things to look out for when Christmas shopping.
Tradition by definition has to originate from something, and seeing as Christmas is full of traditions it follows that with a little bit of research we can unearth some origins. And that is exactly what we’ve done. Here are the origins of six Christmas traditions.
The holidays are approaching and I’m cool as a cucumber. In years past, I stressed about having enough money for gifts, decorations, food, you name it and I was anxious about it. Last year, I decided that my days of worrying about the holidays were over. Everyone on my gift list got a handmade present, I reused old decorations and through a potluck dinner. Follow these tips for the holidays and you, too, can have a relaxing Christmas full of joy rather than angst.
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If you’re a dab hand with a needle and cotton and fancy making your own Christmas stockings, there are plenty of patterns available to download for free via web sites such as and all of which offer guidance on suitable fabrics, making up and customising. Depending on how confident you feel, you can adapt the method and materials to match your budget or schedule, and then let your imagination run wild!
Festive Furzedown's fancy boot stockings: a stylish spin on a Yuletide favourite. Photo: MtK
Drawing upon traditional American folk art and quilting techniques, South London-based Festive Furzedown offers a charming array of bespoke Christmas stockings and handmade hanging decorations. Inspired by cheerful vintage prints that hark back to Christmases of yore, Connecticut-raised Marianne ten Kate founded Festive Furzedown using remnants from her sewing box. All-too aware that Christmas can be an expensive time of year, ten Kate initially began making decorations for family and friends but this has lately blossomed into a nifty sideline for the keen crafter and former charity exec. “I like the idea of using materials I already have such as fabric scraps, ribbons and buttons, or recycling items that hold sentimental value and creating unique, handmade objects that can be used year after year.” In this respect ten Kate’s creations owe much to the quilting tradition where necessity proved the mother of invention, and family heirlooms were inadvertently created by women using material left over from dress-making.
Handmade stockings ready to fill. Photo: MtK
If the recession is leaving you with a hole in your pocket (not to mention ladders in your tights), there are still plenty of imaginative and cost-effective ways to fill a stocking with seasonal cheer. Take heart from the origins of the Christmas stocking; the story of three sisters left without dowries after their nobleman father squandered the family’s fortune following the death of their mother. So moved by their plight was kindly St. Nicholas that one night he placed a small bag of gold coins in each girl’s stocking as they hung drying by the fireside. Discovering his gifts the following morning, the girls were then able to marry and live happily ever after, and ever since children have been hanging up their stockings ready for Santa to fill with treats.
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Christmas is coming and the shoppers are ready to hit the malls and find the best bargains they can. It all starts the day after Thanksgiving. The Friday morning after Thanksgiving is when the malls will be packed as soon as they open and everyone will be looking for the hottest gifts of the season on sale. When all the heavy duty shopping is done, that’s when most people turn their attention toward stocking stuffers also known as stocking fillers in the United Kingdom, the fun little gifts that people buy to fill stockings.
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Everyone loves to receive little gifts and trinkets in their stockings at Christmas time, and recycled or green stocking fillers are a perfect way to keep items out of the landfill by reusing them in an earth-friendly way. Here are a few ideas for green stocking fillers that anyone would love to see in their stocking on Christmas morning.
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