Christmas is a busy time for everyone, you need to think about the food, the guests (if you are hosting the Christmas meal), the presents and the entertainment. Here are 5 steps you may wish to follow to help you prepare for Christmas:

Presents

Making a list of all the presents you want to purchase is key because you don’t want to end up going to the shopping centre last minute and picking presents out without an idea of what to get your children, friends or family because this usually means spending more money on things you didn’t want to get in the first place but bought any way due to pressure and time.

Once you have the list you can check online where you can get the best deals from. If you can get all the presents from the same shop then not only will it save you time, it will save you money too especially if you are buying the items online, you can pay for just one delivery charge. If you are physically going into the shop, you don’t have to spend time and unnecessary money on fuel going to 5 different shops when you know they are available all from one shop.

Once you have all your presents in place and have wrapped them all up, you can move onto the second stage…

Entertainment

Who doesn’t love going into a home with a glowing warm fire in the house. It is important to have your chimney swept as you will be more likely to use your fire more often when your family and friends are over particularly during the Christmas holidays when you are more likely to throw a party. You can make your fire last longer too with a Firemizer so you don’t have to worry about refuelling your fire as often when you are playing charades or a board game with the family. Or unwrapping Christmas presents…

Decorations

Christmas is slowly creeping in now, it is time to put the Christmas tree up and decorate your house and the most focal point of your home – the fireplace. Begin by decorating the Christmas tree with your favourite colours or have a theme. Then move onto the fireplace mantel, you can hang a ‘Merry Christmas’ bunting across the mantel or stockings filled with small gifts or put festive decorations on top of the mantel such as garlands or candles. Christmas is all about being with your loved ones and food of course, so why not decorate a gingerbread man house with your loved ones and make it your focal point if you haven’t got a fireplace, it’s fun and you get to be creative and if you’re feeling extra creative why not make the gingerbread house from scratch?

Top tip: Make sure it isn’t too low to avoid the decorations from catching fire!

Food

It’s time to go food shopping for all the necessities e.g turkey, mulled wine, mince pies, vegetables, Christmas pudding etc… if you decide to buy the food a week before, make sure you keep the food refrigerated to preserve longer.

Preparing More Entertainment

Download all your favourite Christmas tunes so you can have some festive music in the background when your guests arrive or if you have time, learn a few Christmas songs you have always wanted to play on a musical instrument and impress your family and/or friends.

These are just some of our ideas to help you prepare for Christmas. We would love to hear how you prepare for in readiness for Christmas.