It's Christmas!

Your annual guide to the best toys, fashion, travel, food and drink for the season

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More efficient delivery than Amazon - Santa Claus in his sleigh in the Arctic Circle. Photograph: Reuters/Pawel Kopczynski

Global warming puts Santa’s delivery system at risk

John FitzGerald: Have Eircodes made Santa’s job easier? And other bah humbug observations

Send us your stories of the most ghastly gifts of Christmasses past and if you’ve a photo of said offending articles all the better. Photograph: Getty

Tell us about your worst Christmas present ever

From the book you received inscribed with someone else’s name to the ‘stylish’ ironing board cover - we want to hear all

Google’s Santa Tracker has plenty of interactive games for the kids to play right through December

Appy Christmas: Five of the best – and not just for the kids

Track Santa on Christmas Eve, laugh at yourselves as dancing elves, and more

Stepfanie Preissner: “Santa took my soothers one Christmas morning and gave me a Wendy House instead. It was the worst trade-off ever. Never forgave him.”

Stefanie Preissner: I never forgave Santa for taking my soothers

The Can't Cope, Won't Cope writer on what she really wants for Christmas

Alex Conyngham: Weirdest Christmas present: “An empty box – I was told to fill it with ideas.”

All I Want for Christmas – Alex Conyngham, cofounder, Slane Distillery

After a busy year launching Slane Irish Whiskey in the US, time off with the family is top of the list

Christmas is not about being a domestic goddess, or trying to impress people, it’s not even about what you eat exactly but how, where and with whom.

Recipe for an imperfect Christmas

The season has been hijacked by celebrity chefs and lifestyle gurus but they can’t beat the taste of a real home

Top wrapper: Sharon Hearne-Smith has worked with everyone from Jamie Oliver to Lorraine Pascale. Photograph: Alan Betson

Get Christmas wrapped up

Lifestyle guru Sharon Hearne-Smith on the art of perfect gift-wrapping

With retail sales growing at 4.5 per cent year on year, Fingerlings are this Christmas’s craze toy.

We’re back: Irish consumers finally re-emerge for Christmas

Caveat: Craze for robotic monkey toys a sign we’re beginning to ape boom times

Alison Spittle: “Granny giving me a thong – that was wrong in so many ways”

All I want for Christmas – Alison Spittle, comedian

A prawn cocktail binge is an essential ingredient

Emer McLysaght and Sarah Breen, authors of ‘Oh My God, What a Complete Aisling: The Novel’. Photograph: Nathalie Marquez Courtney

A very Aisling Christmas

Go easy on the West Coast Coolers and time the drive Down Home carefully: some practical advice from a sensible Irish girl

Retro Christmas: would you go for a traditional look? Illustration: iStock/Getty

Deck the halls, walls, floors . . .

Some of Ireland’s top designers share their Christmas decorating likes – and dislikes

Tommy Tiernan: “I wouldn’t be surprised if I came to consciousness in three minutes’ time in a carpet factory in Navan, with some foreman shouting ‘Cop on Tiernan! Stop daydreaming!’”

Tommy Tiernan: ‘I love going to Mass. It’s all about the losers’

Comedian, chat show host and now actor talks comedy, Christmas and Catholicism

Die Hard Trilogy (1996)

Christmas games to Yuletide you over

Video games with a festive flavour

Richard Stearn: head chef at Suesey Street in Dublin. Photograph: Dara Mac Dónaill

Seasons eatings

Richard Stearn, head chef at Suesey Street restaurant in Dublin, and Imen McDonnell, food writer, photographer and filmmaker, share Christmas memories and recipes

TV presenter Lucy Kennedy: The best Christmas gift I ever got was little baby Jess, who arrived safely last year and completed our family

Lucy Kennedy: three Christmas essentials – PJs, red wine and chocolate

For the busy working mother, a decent night’s kip is top of the list

Neil Delamere: “My best Christmas present: We fostered a dog one Christmas and he ended up staying with us for years. That dog gave us so much joy every single day of his life that it was the best gift imaginable.”

All I want for Christmas – Neil Delamere, comedian

Anything cultural or educational is out

John Healy: “People getting too drunk. Obnoxious behaviour ruins the Christmas spirit”

All I want for Christmas – John Healy, TV personality and general manager at Suesey Street

Christmas is a marathon of lunch, dinner, eat, sleep, repeat

Amanda Byram: Christmas is second and third helpings of dinner – but it’s Christmas, so all bets are off. Photograph: Michael Chester

Amanda Byram: I’ve started searching for my ‘Dancing with the Stars’ frocks already

TV presenter, health and travel writer on jet lag and heading home for Christmas

Christmas special: peppermint hot chocolate with a candy cane, available at Carters, Waterford. Photograph: iStock

Hot chocolate heaven

Spicy, cinnamon, mocha, mint, chili, caramel and nutella are some of the hot chocolate flavours for this winter

The skating rink at the Rockefeller Center in New York. Photograph: iStock

Get your skates on: the best ice rinks at home and abroad

We spin around the best ice-skating venues in Ireland and around the world

Christmas wishes: Belle Brechin, Evie Smith, Sonny Byrne, JJ Mc Loughlin, Faolán Ó Murchú-Toner and Finn Smith. Photograph: Dara Mac Dónaill

‘I would like to wake up at Christmas to find a sweet trail leading down the stairs’

While Christmas is all about the kids, there are a few little touches they would like us to do differently

Polaroid Pop, €259.99, Argos.

Gadgets not just for geeks

These devices would be welcome in any Christmas stocking

Subbuteo: the greatest football game ever invented. Photograph: Michael Gottschalk/AFP/Getty

Pitch-perfect presents for under the tree this Christmas

Gifts guaranteed to win over sports fans

Poet Gerald Dawe is hoping to receive Derek Mahon’s collection of new poems, Rising Late.

Chapter and verse on all things literary

Readers and writers share the books they’re giving – and the titles they’re hoping to get – this Christmas

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Five beauty products I can’t do without at Christmas

Two ‘Irish Times’ journalists reveal the products they swear by to get them through the party season

This year’s most covetable beauty treats

Christmas gifts for the beauty in your life

Dan Stevens as Charles Dickens in ‘The Man Who Invented Christmas’: “At the time when Dickens was writing, Christmas was a minor religious holiday. It wasn’t at all like it is today. He introduced a couple of things.”

The man who ruined Christmas

Four years after his much-lamented death in a Downton Abbey Christmas special, actor Dan Stevens is restoring some festive cheer with his portrayal of Charles Dickens, the writer credited with ‘inventing’ Christmas

Bernard O’Shea: “The greatest gift that Christmas can give any parent: the threat of Santa Claus.”

The Great Irish Times Christmas debate

Is it the season to be jolly or does it bring out your inner Scrooge? It’s selection boxes at dawn for comedians Bernard O’Shea (Ho, Ho, Ho) and Karl Spain (Bah! Humbug)

Ken doll, €12.99, Smyths.

Top treats for tots

The little ones will be thrilled to find one of these under the Christmas tree

Shirt, £49.95, waistcoat, £69.95, whitestuff.com.

Gifts for him this Christmas

A selection of gorgeous, and useful, gifts the men in your life will love

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Gifts for her this Christmas

Gorgeous presents for the women in your life

I loved the pin-up girl thing, but I was so boxed in. It’s nice to have shed that, especially as you get older – it’s unhealthy to stay the same.”

‘Bono and Ali are very good at having fun. I can barely keep up’

Dublin singer Imelda May on her marriage break-up, a new look and a searingly honest album

Skellig Michael Lego set released as new Star Wars film gets ready to launch

Ancient beehive to feature in set which will be released for Christmas market

Sarah wears dress, €195 for three-days hire, Badgley Mischka, Covet; stole, €150, les d’Arcs , Si Jolie; leather gloves, €60, Paula Rowan; Shoes, €14, Pennys; bracelets, €54, earrings, €69, all Stella & Dot
Karen wears knit sweater €59.90, The Sweater Company; skirt, €225, Jenny Yoo, Covet; gloves, €170, Paula Rowan; shoes, €55 Lost Ink.

Festive remix: Tear up the fashion rule book this Christmas

A little black dress is always good, but who says festive fashion has to be so cut and dry?

Theresa May: she’s so far out of her depth, I’m thinking I might need to give her a canoe instead of the soft Brexit she’s been asking me for all year: Photograph: Peter Byrne/PA Wire

Santa’s naughty and nice list – who’s on it?

The good and bad girls and boys . . . and one who had better watch out

War for the Planet of the Apes: The Planet of the Apes prequel trilogy (or is it interquel?) is among the most fulfilling franchises of recent years.

From the millennial to the rock geezer: Gifts for movie and music buffs

Gifts for movie and music buffs

Arnotts at Christmas. Photograph: David Sleator

Michael Harding: How I discovered Santa was real

The annual winter trip to Dublin was my only chance to get a word in Santa’s ear

Marks and Spencer Advent Calendar (€40 when you spend €40 on clothing, beauty or home products)

10 great beauty advent calendars (and one not to waste your money on)

Beauty: Laura Kennedy reports on what are basically ‘Kinder Eggs for adults’

If parents can figure out an arrangement they are both happy with, then the child will be happy with it

Sometimes faking happiness is an act of parental love

Parents can turn Christmas Day into a battlefield or a pleasant experience for their child

Is it cheaper to cross the Border to stock up for Christmas?

More bang for (foodie) buck in Tesco and M&S up North, but smaller price gap for toys

How to Cook Christmas Let the Irish Times Food and Drink team save your Christmas dinner

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