Saturday 23 February 2013

60th birthday present: It's arrived at last!

WELL! Our package for Bestafar's birthday (which was LAST Thursday) finally showed up one week too late!! Oh dear. The story behind that parcel could be a blog post in itself... but I won't bore you with that!

I posted this picture last Thursday... and thought you might like a sneaky peak into what we packed inside. 60 is a special birthday, and we wanted to send something to Dave's Dad that showed we had put some thought into it... we didn't want jokey presents that just end up in the bin, and we didn't want a present that looked like we hadn't put the thought in.

So we did some research.

I had this idea that it would be cool to investigate the headlines of 1953 (the year Robert was born) and link those headlines up with some appropriate and nice pressies... so here you have it. Just in case any of you know anyone with a big birthday coming up, this idea could be adapted for any age! All you need to do is get on the newspaper websites and check out what happened in the year that person was born!

After some research, and reading a LOT of random facts... we boiled the year down to the following key events. As we looked through the events, we were brainstorming presents they could link to that we knew Robert would like. We then wrote the headlines down on luggage tags with some little sketches to go alongside and make 'em look a bit more interesting- the challenge was to keep them "manly" and not too cutesy!


After that, Dave headed off shopping with a VERY specific shopping list to get the pressies to match the headlines...

Here you have them...


Headline: The Queen is coronated after taking the throne from her Father, King George the VI
Present: The King's Speech DVD - a brilliant film about Queen Elizabeth's Father...



Headline: The discovery of REM sleep is first published by researchers
Present: A nice pair of cosy PJs




Headline: The Everest summit is reached for the first time...
Present: A warm pair of gloves (remember my Father-in-law lives in Norway!)




Headline: Sweet rationing finally ends in Britain
Present: Robert is a HUGE boiled sweet fan, so this one was a no-brainer...




Headline: The mass production of teabags is started by Tetley in Britain...
Present: Some good old Tetley teabags - a little taste of the homeland!



and finally...

Headline: Robert is born in Derby on Valentine's Day
Present: a beautiful and very accurate (!!?) portrait of her grandfather by none other than Ava M...


We wrapped everything up with kitschy heart ribbon, as Robert's birthday is on Valentines day, and packed it off with the accompanying poem...


Maybe an idea you could adapt and use?!

Happy birthday Robert... sorry it was so late, but we hope you liked all the little pressies!!!

32 comments:

  1. What a lovely idea, Claire. I love that kind of creative thinking!

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  2. Wirklich ein tolles, persönliches Geschenk! Ich bin mir sicher, dass sich Robert sehr gefreut hat!
    Die Idee behalte ich mir auf jeden Fall im Hinterkopf!

    ... und ich bin ja so froh, dass nicht nur ich die Pakete generell zu spät los schicke ;-)

    LG Catrin

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  3. what is a boiled sweet?

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  4. Thank you so much for sharing! I am going to use this for my mom's 60th birthday. So creative!!

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  5. I just wanted to say thank you!! I found your post on pinterest and decided to use it for my friends moms birthday and she absolutely adored it!! I went ahead and pinned pictures of what mine looked liked and made sure to give you credit and link to your site :-) Thanks agains!

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  6. I stumpled upon this post through Pinterest and am totally going to do this for my dad! his 60th birthday is in a couple of days and i've been stumped at what to do. thanks soo much for putting this together!

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  7. Wow...I am so impressed, wish my parents were still here to do thus for them! I would love for my children to do this for me. Thanks for the inspiration and for sharing!

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  8. Thanks for the idea!!! I tweaked mine for 1954:

    First line: 60 years have past, therefore, We thought we’d go back to ’54.
    Last Line: So back we’ll go and we’ll explore, What happened in 1954?

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  9. AWESOME! I'm 17 and will definitely be using this for my mom ❤️❤️❤️ Thanks so much!

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  10. Thank you for such an inspired idea! My husband and I took it and ran with it...60 gifts for his Mum's 60th. We used headlines of 1954 and also events using her birthdate Sept 16th. Only a few more days to the party and big reveal of the gift. I expect everyone will LOVE it! And it was such a blast to put together, almost like a scavenger hunt. :-)

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  11. Thank you for such an inspired idea! My husband and I took it and ran with it...60 gifts for his Mum's 60th. We used headlines of 1954 and also events using her birthdate Sept 16th. Only a few more days to the party and big reveal of the gift. I expect everyone will LOVE it! And it was such a blast to put together, like a scavenger hunt! :)

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  12. I LOVE this idea. Thank you so much!!

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  13. I have never seen anything like this and I think it is simply BRILLIANT! Thank you for sharing your genius with the world. :) Nicely done.

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  14. With my Mothers birthday slowly approaching.... I'm going to do this. Thank you for sharing!!

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  15. Super cute! Using this for my mom's bday! Now to come up with a rhyme for '42. Also, not to be a miss know it all, but for any future readers who use this idea, be sure to change "past" in the first line to "passed." LOVE the idea; going to share it with friends!

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  16. My husband's turning 65 in 2 months. He will so appreciate this! Thanks.

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  17. A great idea! But I'm having difficulty finding events because most newspaper sites require a subscription. Any ideas Clarina? Xx

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  18. I LOVE this idea! I'm doing it for my dad's 65th birthday. Instead of doing the year (there's only 3 headlines!), I'm doing the date. I picked a bunch of stuff that happened on the date and the tags will say the year and event. Thanks for the awesome inspiration!

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  19. Love this my grandfather will be 100 next April and I am going to use the idea. Thanks.

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  20. This is a fantastic idea! I will see what I can do for my husband's 40th birthday.

    My Bright Blue House

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  21. So thoughtful! This would make a milestone birthday Memorable

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  22. Brilliant! Could be adapted as a Christmas or New Year's gift for the kids-- something that represents events from the past year. I adore the birthday idea for anyone, but particularly older people who have everything. Thank you!

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  23. This idea is perfect for any milestone event!!! Thank you so very much for sharing your idea. My husband's 70th is coming up in another year--plenty of time to gather gifts to match headlines.

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  24. Cute idea! Just one comment from an editor: *passed, not past :-)

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  25. Wow, my husband turns 50 this year, what a fun thing to do for him, he will really appreciate this. Thank you for sharing your great idea!!

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    Great Birthday Gifts for Her

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