This week, I was in my local supermarket and my four year old pulled me to see something….. the first Selection Box of the year! (I can guarantee, last year’s selection boxes are well gone in our house before the new year began!) My daughter reminded me that Santa brought her one. For a second I thought ‘surely I didn’t let Santa leave MORE chocolate for my children on Christmas Day’ and then I remembered that she got one when Santa visited a weekly club she attends, so I said, ‘Yes, you’re right, you got that at ….club’ to which she replied, ‘and when he visited our estate’. She was right, she received two selection boxes from Santa last year and her sister received three! I’ve nothing against selection boxes but I do have a problem when my children start to think that it’s normal to eat chocolate every day and I know I’m not the only parent who feels strongly about this.
So, if you’re organising a Christmas party this year whether for a business or an organisation, can I help you think outside the ‘Selection box’ and tell Santa to bring an alternative gift for the children? I know many Christmas parties work on tight budgets but there are certainly fun stuff that Santa can bring that cost about the same price as a selection box, will last longer and won’t result in obesity and rotten teeth! So, I’ve made a small list under 3 categories – €3 or less, €5 and €10.
Santa presents that cost Santa €3 or less
- A Set of 5 Bouncy Balls
- Scratch and Sniff Stickers
- A Novelty Pencil
- A Sticky Gel Creature
- A Box of Street Chalks
- Pick Up Sticks Game
- Rattle Magnets
- A Moody Squeeze Face
- A Code Breaker Activity Book
Gifts Santa could give that cost €5
- A self inflating whoopee cushion
- A Jingle Stick
- A wooden Magic Wand
- A gymnastics Ribbon
- A bug viewer
- Some temporary tattoos – I stock dinos, weather emojis, space, heroes vs villains. animals, unicorns and sweet mimi.
- A net with 102 Marbles
- Create your own Wobbly Whale paper craft
Santa Gifts that cost €10
If Santa is visiting the boys and girls in a club or society (like the GAA), he usually just brings something small. But often businesses have Christmas parties for their staff’s children and when this happens, he tends to be more generous. Here are a list of toys that cost just €10
- a wooden stacking toy
- A 2 piece puzzle – this one here is a Numbers one.
- A baby crocheted rattle. This one here is the Watermelon one. I also sell Ice-lolly, Rainbow and pineapple ones.
- Mosaic Pictures Craft Set
- A Lotto Game
- A Make your own Geodes Science Kit
- Bubble Lab Science Kit
- A 16 piece jigsaw. I stock Ice-Cream Vans and a Fire Engines themed ones.
- Magic Velvet Colouring Books with Markers. Again, I stock 2 types – an animals one and a butterfly one.
- Lacing Pictures Activity Box
- Reusable Sticker Pictures Box Set
- Decorate your own Bracelets Kit
- A fabric baby book. I sell the Dinosaur ones and Farm Animal ones.
- A felt words and pictures set.
- A reusable sticker calendar.
I’m really excited about the upcoming Christmas season and although I appeared a bit disgruntled about the number of selection boxes my girls received last year – the reality is that I ate most of the chocolate (and they were too young to notice!), so I can’t really complain about that!
Enjoy the run up to the season and I hope, if you are organising a children’s Christmas Party, that this little blog will have given you some inspiration. If you are organising a corporate Christmas party for children and your budget is bigger than €10 per gift, I stock lots of more expensive toys, games, crafts and kits so please browse my website or send me a message and I can try and help you select toys that will work best for you.
x Suzie
At this time of year, lots of people get concerned about the delivery of their orders. You can see some shipping queries answered in this blog. Or, you might be interested in hearing what some people receive in stocking stuffers.
