For our family, this Christmas has seemed hectic. As unpredictable obstacles chipped away my sense of organisation, I even found myself traversing the shops late on Christmas Eve searching for an elusive pack of Christmas crackers! So it was no wonder that I completely forgot to secure a set of thank you cards to send after the big day - it was all I could do to be prepared for the 25th!

Rather than venture out again, I found a stack of card stock and decided to create my own this year: an elegant, understated design with just a touch of festive colour. These cards are designed to fit standard C6 envelopes, which are easy to source if you don't already have a few lying around. 

I've created an A4 size PDF for this folded thank you card, which you can download below. Use the guides to cut neatly along the edges and score along the centre to create your card. 

Feel free to download and share this free printable thank you card to your heart's content. However, selling this design (either as a template or finished card) is forbidden: the content presented here is intended to be free to all!

Download this elegant, free printable thank you card (PDF)

I hope you will enjoy making and sending this free thank you card! You may also like to look at my collection of beautiful free thank you printables created by talented designers from across the web.

 

Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas!

We recently redecorated our lounge in preparation for Christmas and I realised we have very little seasonal art to accompany our tree and tinsel. As a remedy, I designed this simple festive printable, and decided to share it here for others to use too.

I've created PDFs in two different sizes to suit differing needs. We printed the 5x7 size which sits in a frame on the mantelpiece. Alternatively, you may prefer the large A4 size, which you could easily adapt to create cards, tags or any other design you may need. 

Download the Joyeux Noël printables here:

5x7 size, with crop marks (PDF)

A4 size PDF | A4 size PNG (for use in other projects)

Please feel free to use this free printable in any of your projects. However, I would appreciate credit to Glamumous by means of a link should you share the printables on your own site or social media.

Feel free to leave your comments and suggestions below.

In those precious moments of calm between furtive festive preparations, what better way to unwind than to curl up with a classic Christmas tale or two?

Luckily, there are many seasonal novels and stories of this variety we can download to our e-readers for free, saving both time and money for those occasions when inspiration strikes. 

I've collected here a selection of classic Christmas stories which are available for both the Kindle and Kobo, and where possible I'll direct you to beautiful or illustrated editions - all of which are completely free!

A Visit from Saint Nicholas (The Night Before Christmas), attributed to Clement Clarke Moore

On the night of Christmas Eve, a family is settling down to sleep when the father is disturbed by noises on the lawn outside. Looking out the window, he sees Saint Nicholas in a sleigh pulled by eight reindeer...

Old Christmas by Washington Irving

The Nutcracker and the Mouse King by E. T. A. Hoffmann

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

Image credit: MaxPixel

Santa/Father Christmas

Santa’s Grotto

Reindeerland

XM4 5HQ

Our best wishes from our home to yours for this holiday season!

Christmas shopping provided a glutton of gloriously scented clementines. Traditionally, oranges were given as gifts and placed in the foot of a stocking. Though this tradition harks back to less prosperous times when fresh fruit was considered a rare and expensive treat, it is also steeped in festive legend.

During his lifetime, Saint Nicholas was a bishop whose generosity to give while expecting nothing in return appears to have inspired our practice of gifting at Christmas. The legend tells us that he was travelling through a village where a widowed father was troubled that he could not afford dowries for his three beautiful daughters. Saint Nicholas, upon hearing of the poor widower's plight, knew the man would be too proud to accept money as a gift. Instead, he threw three bags of gold down chimney of the family home, under the cover of night. One of the bags caught a stocking which had been hung to dry on the fireplace, which overnight hardened into a ball of gold, now symbolised by the vibrant colour of oranges in our modern homage to the legend.

Since today is the Winter Solstice (just four sleeps away from the big day), my daughter and I decided to decorate a few as pomanders to scent our home and dinner table centrepiece. Here's how to make your own.

What you will need:

• Firm citrus fruits (we used clementines, but you could just as easily use oranges or grapefruits)
• A jar of whole cloves
• (Optional) Cocktail sticks or a thin nail, to pierce the skin
• A citrus zester or vegetable peeler
• (Optional) Ribbon or baker's twine, if you want to hang your finished pomanders

Instructions

1. Using the corner of your citrus zester (or the corner of a vegetable peeler, though this will create wider lines), carve a design into the skin of your fruit. Be sure to apply a light touch, so as not to expose the fruit inside. For our designs, we used a combination of swirls and lines.
2. Once you've finished scoring your design, push whole cloves into the gaps of your design. We've found that more cloves not only provide a stronger scent, but allow the fruit to dry out faster, giving them a longer shelf life. Using a cocktail stick or thin nail to break tough citrus skin can help you push in the cloves more easily.
3. To finish, you could arrange your pomanders in a bowl or on a plate, using greenery, fir cones or other festive to decorate. If you would like to hang your pomanders, wrap a ribbon or colourful baker's twine around the outside and tie a loop at the top. 

Unfortunately, pomanders don't usually have a long shelf life and may become mouldy. You may want to display them for only a few hours each day, refrigerating between sessions to prolong their life and scent. Alternatively, hang them in a cool dry place to enable the flesh to completely dry out.

We hope you will enjoy making your own spiced pomander balls! If you have any tips to prolong the life of these festive treats, please feel free to share in the comments below.

Sending thank you cards or notes is a wonderful tradition to show appreciation for the gifts or experiences offered by family and friends over the holidays.

Having received some truly thoughtful gifts this year, I wanted to find some beautiful notecards and scoured Pinterest for inspiration and discovered a plethora of delightful printable designs which we can use for free!

Here is a hand-picked selection of my favourite Christmas thank you printables, including designs suitable for both adults and children. If you've not already organised your post-holiday stationary, you're sure to find your something ideal for your needs in this list!

Here is a beautiful poem by Sharon Jaynes which I would like to share with you. It is based on the Bible verses from 1-13 of Corinthians, and was originally posted on A Girl Called Jack.

If I decorate my house perfectly with plaid bows, strands of twinkling lights, and shiny glass balls but do not show love to my family, I’m just another decorator. 

If I slave away in the kitchen, baking dozens of Christmas cookies, preparing gourmet meals, and arranging a beautifully adorned table at mealtime but do not show love to my family, I'm just another cook. 

If I work at the soup kitchen, carol in the nursing home, and give all that I have to charity but do not show love to my family, it profits me nothing. 

If I trim the spruce with shimmering angels and crocheted snowflakes, attend a myriad of holiday parties, and sing in the choir’s cantata but do not focus on love, I have missed the point. 

Love stops the cooking to hug the child. Love sets aside the decorating to kiss the husband. Love is kind, though harried and tired. 

Love doesn't envy another’s home that has coordinated Christmas china and table linens. 

Love doesn't yell at the kids to get out of the way. Love doesn't give only to those who are able to give in return but rejoices in giving to those who can’t. 

Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. 

Video games will break, pearl necklaces will be lost, golf clubs will rust. But giving the gift of love will endure.

Photo credit: Jenny Downing, via Flickr 

It's the most wonderful time of the year... But even the most organised among us need a little extra help from time to time.

To make your festive frivolities run a little more smoothly, here is a selection of clever Christmas tips to get you through the season, from last-minute gift-wrap ideas to fun ways to keep the kids entertained on Christmas eve.

I hope you all enjoy these tips, and wish you all a verry merry start to the holidays!

During the run-up to Christmas, I love nothing more than curling up with a good book in the evenings. There's something magical about cosying up indoors during the winter months to enjoy a fantastic story. Stories before the younger children head off to bed help build up their anticipation for our favourite day of the whole year, while I particularly enjoy my own fix of grown-up literature to arouse my festive spirits.

In this post, I've collected 25 festive and winter-themed books for all ages. Some are our personal favourites, while others have been recommended by fellow book-lovers as titles particularly suited for Christmas.

I hope you enjoy this collection, and find a few new titles to add to you Christmas reading list this year!

Some of the most precious gifts are those which are hand-crafted with thought and love. But unfortunately, not all hand-made gifts are made equal. Home-baked cookies and embellished photo frames have become somewhat commonplace in the realm of DIY gifting.

For this post, I set out to collect a huge list of gift ideas which are truly remarkable: those which I would not only feel proud to have made, but would secretly like to keep for myself... Furthermore, if supplies are needed to create these clever DIY projects, the total should not exceed $10 (or about £5) per gift.

Whether you are on a tight budget or simply want to create a more meaningful gesture this Christmas, consider making one of these 65 desirable DIY gifts for friends and family members to enjoy.