Oohhh.. is it nigella Express? was just talking about that tonight... or has she got another one?? I love her..

I try and do it all online...with a theme..pyjamas one year, family games the next..saves me from worrying about duplicating. Saw a bit of Oprah today and she had an offer from Snapfish on her web page where you could make a photo book (usually $30) for free if you did it within the next 48 hours! My parents will take back stuff for me this year and post it on, including Crimbo cards

For my kids my family give me English money (they put it in my UK account) then I convert to the US amount. I spend my money on the gift and keep the other money in the UK account for our future trips... works out great.

A couple of good sites for sending to the U.K is www.voucherexpress.co.uk/index.asp they are very good charge 1 pound for delivery also I use www.sendit.com/sendit/home.dept for dvd's c.d.'s and games, they are a great company from Ireland they are very helpful, they also ship to the U.S.

Put in in your UK bank account...you did keep it open didn't you? Give the kids the $ equivalent.

It's Nigella Christmas, Nigella Express is fantastic too though.

Thanks for those links...really helpful

I too think one of the easiest ways to send gifts is to order from british websites and get them directly delivered to the right person's door. A lot of webistes offer free postage too so take advantage of it.

I have found the shipping from the US to the UK is getting more and more expensive each year. So I will send the small stuff that way but if I want to send a book or a larger gift then I use the Amazon and John Lewis, both of whom will gift wrap. For years I've also used Voucher Express when I've not been sure what gift to get and didn't want to send cash

Do you remember the advert they used to run for Royal mail..the "I saw this and thought of you"..well I used to love doing that untill the postage started costing more than the little gifts..

this year we've all decided to buy our kids a little something special and put each others names on it..as we all know what our kids want and we also get to save on postage..which will work out great as I'll just go to Toys r us and get everything in one shop..

We just have to remember to tell each other what we've bought for our kids..

Just use amazon Uk or any of the british stores that have websites(which most do these days). Or for the price your paying book a flight back to the u.k and tell them you brought yourself for christmas. Christmas is a time for family not gifts which no one really appreciates anyway.

http://www.retailmenot.com/

might help cut the costs down - they have coupon codes for both UK and US stores when you shop online.

As another poster has mentioned here, voucher express is fast, easy and there are a lot of choices, and that cuts down on postage a lot!!!!! Last year, I made the mistake of getting the OH to mail the packages for me and it was almost $200 I, too, as other posters have mentioned, take time to wrap/decorate real pretty, but not going to this year. Neither have the inclination nor $$$$$$s to spare. Have bought a few 'light weight' items which I will mail, but the rest will get gift cards from VE. My old mum pissed me off the other day though (shame on me coz she's 83), I was moaning to her about the stock market crash, having lost copious amounts of $$$$s (like almost everybody) coupled with the fact that I do not have employment, saying that I would be sending gifts but not to the extent of previous years, her reply was " ..................... glad you mentioned that, would you mind sending me a bottle of Chanel - the real stuff (perfume), not the eau de cologne you usually send me. WTF (excuse me, but I could have ripped her lips off)! I told dear OH I was gonna send her one of those little 'sample' ones they give you in magazines, with her Christmas card (I'm still thinking of it)!

the amazon gift wrapping cost a fiver and it's crap...because they just include the wrapping in the box, you've got to wrap it yourself, unless they've changed since last time I used it...

But, gift cards, local online stores and errr...tell them the stuff got lost in the post?

Don't think you can ship stuff over from here any more, but my mother just shipped stuff over from blighty and was cheap as chips, sent as small packages for a good rate, she broke the stuff up into three smaller parcels, took 4 weeks to get here.

hahaha... oh god i am bunged up with flu but literally peeing my pants and choking... so frigging clever. Good idea. We dont do family that is away.. we do if we see u u get something if we dont.. u dont. Although the cheapo way i get away with it is i pick up a uk trip and bring back tins and tins of buscuits and thats what all the americans get and my bestest f in the uk.. i go and buy something wearable coz its a lot cheaper here.