How to Curb Your Christmas Spending

by Derinda Wildman, Cheltenham and North Cotswolds NCT

Christmas! What a great time of year, and all the more exciting for sharing with your new baby, family and friends. But with presents to buy and cards to send, the tree and decorations, festive fare and visits to Santa, is it possible to do this on a limited budget without feeling distinctly unfestive or like Scrooge? I’m delighted to say that indeed it is, and here are some ideas that might help to save some pennies!

Christmas Trees

Christmas trees are an integral part of the celebrations in our house, and my children love the family tradition of decorating the tree together, but they can be expensive. So how about having a small tree with roots that you can plant out in your garden and use year after year? An artificial tree can also last many years (and you don’t have needle drop to worry about with little feet padding around). In our house we’ve decorated a large plant with fairy lights and small decorations and it looked fantastic! Or how about adorning some small branches and twigs with the fairy lights and decorations for an equally enchanting effect?

Decorations

For decorations, we like to get creative and the children have made some lovely ones - they love being part of the Xmas preparations too. Shapes made from card (stars, baubles, angels etc) and decorated, with a hole punched in the top and threaded will keep the little ones amused for a while, as will making paper chains, cutting snowflakes from paper, and making salt dough decorations. Oranges studded with cloves and hung with red ribbon always look lovely and give a wonderful festive fragrance (so long as they’re taken down before they go off, which doesn’t smell so good!). Ivy and other evergreens can be gathered from outside and draped around the room (remember not to use real mistletoe as the berries are poisonous), and a vase or dish filled with pine cones (left natural or sprayed with silver or gold paint) all give a festive feel.

Presents

And so to the presents! For children’s toys the NCT Nearly New Sale is a fantastic treasure trove, and relatives love pictures made by the children (hand and foot prints of little ones are always well received). Personal and homemade presents are always lovely gifts – it really is the thought that counts here! Edible gifts (sweets, biscuits, cakes) and home grown plants are appreciated and children can be involved in making these too, as well as simple rolled candles (craft shops sell wicks and wax sheets for rolling and the candles can be decorated with glitter for that Christmas sparkle). 

The gift of time is always valued and this can easily be made into a voucher promising the recipient a skill or service that you can offer e.g. entitlement to an evening’s babysitting, a promise of a home cooked meal, breakfast in bed, gardening – the possibilities are endless!  Groups of relatives or friends may also consider setting a budget for presents or operating a ‘Secret Santa’ system where everyone in the group buys just a present for one other person (chosen by picking names from Santa’s hat maybe?) It’s amazing what can be found on a limited budget, particularly if you buy from charity shops (a feel good factor too as the charity is also benefiting)!

Wrapping

Which brings us on to the wrapping … here the possibilities are endless: brown paper painted with your little one’s hand or foot prints and tied with string or red ribbon; pages from newspapers and magazines colour-washed with paint by the children (cheery stories only on the pages please!); fabric, hessian, or for those big awkward presents, a sheet, tied with a bow; or last year’s wrapping paper reused (a quick iron first helps – cool setting only!). Tags can be made by cutting pictures from last year’s cards, or use Christmas shapes made from thin card, painted and decorated by the children.

Cards

The expense of buying and posting Christmas cards can be reduced by sending e-cards instead (some charities offer free e-cards, others ask for a donations). Alternatively some people only send cards to those they won’t see over the festive period. Of course cards can be hand delivered to those who live locally saving on the postage (and the family get to enjoy seeing all the pretty trees and decorations in the windows of your neighbours as they do the deliveries). Children love to make cards too: the simplest I have seen was a Christmas tree shape made from a green triangle for the tree and a small red square for the pot (sponge painting or potato printing would work well) with a star sticker on the top – it was very effective and wonderfully personal.

Christmas displays

Even visits to Santa can be done on a budget! Local events e.g. school Christmas fairs, often have Santa walking around chatting to the children. In particular my family love seeing the numerous decorated Christmas trees at the Festival of the Tree (Emmanuel Church, Cheltenham) where Santa can often be seen. Seeing the Christmas lights in your town, village or neighbourhood is also magical for the children (I often take them on dusk walks locally to spot the magnificent lights, trees and decorations of our neighbourhood!) Garden centres too often provide much entertainment gazing at the displays of Christmas lights.

Food

Then there’s the food! Christmas often means huge queues in the supermarket and enough food at home to last as if we were under siege! So, easy ways here to budget are only to buy what you’ll eat, ask guests to contribute by bringing some food (or the prepared vegetables, pudding, drinks, etc) and to buy from local farmers markets or farm shops (sometimes you can pre-order which makes things even easier!) – saves time in the queue and money! If you can control yourself, buy Christmas treats whenever you see them on offer.

I simply love the excitement of Christmas, and can indulge that side of me even more now that I have children. It is made even more exciting for us all by involving them in making presents and decorations, and what could be better than the little ones revelling in your time as you prepare for Christmas with them? So, not a bah humbug in sight! Happy Christmas everyone!

How do you budget at Christmas? Let us know by commenting below.

Christmas Crafts: Salt dough decorations

If haven't yet filled up every spare bit of space on your Christmas tree, you may want to help your children to make some salt dough decorations! Here's how:

Materials

You will need: 80ml water, 50g salt, 100g plain flour, 1 tsp cooking oil.

Method

1. Mix together the salt, flour and cooking oil in a bowl. Add the water a little at a time and mix to a smooth paste that leaves the side of the bowl clean.

2. Place the dough onto a lightly floured board. Use a floured rolling pin to roll out the dough to about 0.5cm thick.

3. Use festive shape cutters to cut out several shapes from the salt dough. Use a straw to make a hole near the top of each shape to thread the ribbon through.

 4. Place them onto a greaseproof baking tray and bake in a preheated oven at 120 degrees C (Gass Mark 1) until they are firm (about 2 hours).

5. Remove the decorations from the oven and leave to cool. Paint and decorate with sequins and glitter glue, then lightly varnish or spray with acrylic lacquer if you want them to last until next year.

6. When dry thread ribbon through the holes and hang on the tree. Instead of buying ribbon, you could save bits of ribbon you cut out of you clothes (the ones that keep the item on the hanger in the shop).

Do you have any Christmas crafts that you'd like to share with us? Let us know by commenting below.

NCT Branch events - January 2013

Bumps, Babies and Beyond

Friday 4th 10 - 11.30am

Methodist Church Hall
Chapel Street
Ely
(Map)
FREE ENTRY including refreshments and home-made cakes.

Since this is the school holidays, we are happy for school age children to come, and will try to make craft activities entertaining for older ones too.

Open Houses

Tuesday 8th 10am - 12noon

At Miranda's house in Stretham

Friday 18th 10am - 12noon

At Nancy's house in Aldreth

Monday 21st 10am - 12noon

At Mags's house in Ely


For more info about open house locations see our facebook page or join our facebook group. Alternatively call 0844 2436175 or email ely_nct@yahoo.co.uk.

Royal Baby Announcement: Severe Pregnancy Sickness

Rosie Dodds, Senior Policy Adviser for NCT, has recently featured in a number of press articles speaking about the Duchess of Cambridge's pregnancy and dealing with severe morning sickness.

The NCT has released the following press statement, which may be of interest to anyone suffering from severe pregnancy sickness:

"NCT is thrilled to learn about the Duchess of Cambridge's pregnancy, we offer our sincere congratulations to both William and Catherine as they start their exciting journey into parenthood. However, we are very sorry to hear about the hospitalisation of the Duchess due to hyperemesis gravidarum, or severe pregnancy sickness. 

"It's thought around 80% of pregnant women experience nausea and vomiting in pregnancy, usually between 8 and 12 weeks of pregnancy. Around 1% suffer from the more severe hyperemesis gravidarum, which is persistent vomiting, so that hospitalisation is generally necessary for intravenous fluids.

"A variety of strategies can help different women to ease the symptoms of nausea and vomiting when pregnant. These include avoiding possible trigger smells such as smoke, and avoiding fatty foods. Although there is limited evidence, the use of ginger, vitamin B6 and acupressure have also been found to be effective for some women, though it's always worth checking with your midwife or doctor first. The traditional remedy of eating dry foods such as toast is unlikely to do any harm.

"Some women find that they can only manage a few foods, and not necessarily nutritious ones at that. In this case it is still better to eat whatever stays down than to go hungry, as that is likely to make the sick feeling worse.

"We wish William and Catherine the best of luck with the pregnancy and hope that the Duchess is feeling better soon."

Some tips for dealing with nausea and vomiting in pregnancy from NCT's website include:

• Resting as much as possible.
• Dividing meals into more frequent snacks and smaller meals throughout the day.
• Eating separately from drinking.
• Eating dry foods such as toast, crispbread or a biscuit before getting up.
• Avoiding trigger smells such as smoke, fumes and cooking odours.
• Avoiding fatty foods.
• Eating plain foods or eating meals cold, to avoid smells that can trigger nausea.
• Drinking little and often.

More information can be found here: http://www.nct.org.uk/pregnancy/nausea-and-vomiting-pregnancy

Martha's Birth

by Karen Cornish

Martha Jean Cornish was born in water, in a fairy-lit room at home just three days before Christmas 2008. She was eight days early, which was a shock, as I thought first babies were supposed to be late!

My NHS midwife wasn’t as enthusiastic as my husband Simon and I about home birth, despite a problem-free pregnancy, and we didn’t feel we were getting the support and encouragement we needed. There was also a chance that no midwife would be available to come out to us and I thought it would be a great shame to miss out on a straightforward home birth just because the midwives were all busy.

A friend recommended an independent midwife called Nicky Garrett and after meeting Nicky we knew we wanted her to deliver our baby.

I woke up on Sunday 21^st December bleeding and I panicked. I’d been waiting for a show but from what I had read I expected just a slight tinge of blood, not a full blown period. We rang Nicky who came over to the house to check everything was ok. It was, but she said we could still be a long way off.

The bleeding stopped and as the day went on I started to notice twinges every now and again. By late afternoon the twinges turned to cramps and it suddenly dawned on me that they were following a regular pattern. We started timing them and they were around every 10 minutes.  At this point I realised that this was it!

At 10pm, Simon rang Nicky and, as she had over an hour’s drive to get to us, she said she would come straight away in case contractions suddenly sped up. She arrived about 11.30pm and by this time the contractions were between six and ten minutes apart lasting around 30 seconds. Nicky did some checks and an internal, which revealed I was around 1.5cm dilated. She said we had a long way to go and made herself a bed on the sofa while we went upstairs to try to get some sleep.

The contractions became stronger throughout the night but I managed to sleep and got up about 8am. I found I was most comfortable kneeling up against the back of the sofa and I think I must have stayed in this position for quite some time.

In the run up to the birth I’d been listening to hypnotherapy CDs every day and I was amazed how completely calm I was. I coped with contractions by breathing in as they started and blowing out as they intensified. This wasn’t something I consciously did, it was instinctive, and this breathing pattern really helped.

At about midday Nicky said she thought I had progressed enough to get into the pool so I did and the warmth of the water was a wonderful relief. I did notice that the contractions became immediately stronger.

After a while I remember noticing a change in the depth of the contractions and I heard myself making a low groaning noise instead of the blowing out I had been doing previously. I also felt really spaced out. Nicky made a note at this point that I was in transition. A little while later I got out of the water to go to the toilet and Nicky offered to examine me. She was surprised to feel the head! I was fully dilated and Nicky said to start pushing when I got the urge.

At this point everything seemed to pause. Suddenly I felt more like myself, chatted and even ate some toast. I got back in the pool and waited for the urge to push; it didn’t come but I tried pushing anyway.

After quite some time. the urge to push came and I had no idea how hard I would actually have to push to get my baby out. Nicky and Simon could both see the top of the baby’s head and were giving me great encouragement and with a really big push her head came out. I remember saying “ouch!” a couple of times at this point but with the next contraction the rest of her was out. My eyes had been shut tight in concentration but when I felt a weight hit my chest I looked down to see two of the biggest eyes I’d ever seen.

After some skin to skin and cord clamping, baby Martha was wrapped in a towel and given to Daddy while I stood up in the pool and pushed out the placenta.

While Nicky checked Martha over I went upstairs for a bath and it was only at that point I realised I’d given birth without any pain relief. I remember Simon giving Martha a tour of the house and showing her the spotty curtains in the bedroom. Nicky stayed with us for another couple of hours and then left us to snuggle into bed together as a family.

NCT Babychange app

We are excited to announce that NCT's award-winning app, Babychange, is now available for both iPhone and Android phones!

 

The iPhone version of NCT Babychange has been helping parents find their nearest baby changing facilities since 2011. After scooping an impressive four industry awards and acquiring a database of over 7,000 baby changing sites across the UK, NCT Babychange has just got even better.

Along with the development of an Android version, the latest version of NCT Babychange boasts loads of new features, an updated design and a more user-friendly interface. It is now easier to add, rate and find baby changing facilities, and users can now add facilities remotely, which will help our database of changing sites continue to grow.

You can download the app from the NCT website at www.nct.org.uk/babychange

Best wishes,
NCT Marketing Team