Father's Day this year falls on June 21st, giving us all a few weeks to come up with the perfect gifts to give as we celebrate the men in our lives and everything that they do for us. This year, with my own lovely dad, my father-in-law and Ian to get gifts for, Kizzy and I decided to get creative and make them some personalised pressies.
We decided that it would be a nice idea to make each dad a personalised mug with a matching pair of coasters, and then filling the mug with something to match their personalities. This gift could then be wrapped in cellophane and finished with a ribbon to create a beautiful, bespoke present that will be treasured.
The first job was to create collages to go onto the mugs and coasters. For my dad and my FIL I used old family and personal photos to create images that would bring back happy memories. For Ian, Kizzy created something arty, celebrating the things that her dad loves (including all five of his kids!) I used Picmonkey to do the photo editing. Making the images first gives you much more creative freedom to design the perfect collage using overlays, clip art and filters.
Once we had the designs, we used Truprint to create the photogifts we wanted. (Truprint currently have a great Father's Day promotion, details of which are at the bottom of this post!) The mugs and coasters are easy to make online by uploading the images onto the site and editing them and adding text. With the mugs you can choose the colour of the inside of the cup and have a choice of font for the text. The coasters come in a pack of six, so by uploading three designs, I made a pair of coasters to match each mug.
Once ordered the photo gifts were delivered to my door within a few days, ready to have the finishing touches applied.
Depending on the dad's tastes, the mug can be filled with all manner of small gifts. We decided on using retro sweets, sachets of hot drinks and character socks and a keyring for our three presents. But you could use stationary products, a new tie, a miniature bottle of brandy with some sachets of coffee, some packs of seeds or some bars of dad's favourite chocolates. Another idea is to make dad some promise vouchers, either by hand or on the computer, to be exchanged for things such as bringing him breakfast in bed, washing his car or letting him take control of the TV for one day!
You can really have fun making this gift, from creating the collages to putting the finished gifts together. I like presents that look good, show thought and are functional after the big day.
The price of the photo gifts that we ordered from Truprint are:
Photo mugs 11 oz from £7.99
Coasters x 6 £14.99
6 x 4 photo prints from 5p
Another quick and easy idea for a Father's Day Gift is to buy a cheap photo frame and buy prints to go in it. It's very simple to do and the photo prints cost just pennies making it a very reasonable gift. This is an excellent present idea for grandads, who you possibly don't get to see very often. It's a nice touch to include a declaration that you promise to send updated photographs four times a year to replace the photographs so they can always have some up to date pictures of the grandchildren hanging on their wall.
You can find the mugs and coasters plus other fantastic Father's Day gift ideas on the Truprint website. Last day for ordering for Father's Day is June 15th.
Truprint have a special Father's Day offer saving you up to £30 off your order.
Code LOVEMYDAD gives £10 discount on order £20-£49.99 and
£30 discount on orders £50 or more!
Minimum spend does not include P&P charges
Offer is valid until midnight 15th June 2015.
Offer is valid for single use during the promotional period
and to customers residing in the UK on Truprint.co.uk only.
P&P charges will apply
Offer cannot be used in conjunction with any other offer or
on pre-paid prints.
Please allow an additional 1-2 delivery days during this
promotional period.
I received credit to make my Father's Day mugs and coasters.