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Stuck for words on your greeting card? We’ve comprised a number of suitable greetings for Christmas cards…

• Wishing you a very merry Christmas.
• Wishing you and yours a very merry Christmas.
• Wishing you and yours a very merry Christmas & prosperous New Year.
• Wishing your family peace and love at Christmas and always.
• Wishing you the love, peace, and joy that the true meaning of Christmas brings.
• May your holiday season be blessed with the true meaning of Christmas.
• May the timeless message of Christmas fill your heart and home with joy today and throughout the coming year.
• Wishing you and your loved ones all the wonder and magic of Christmas.
• May you have the spirit of Christmas which is peace, the gladness of Christmas which is hope and the heart of Christmas which is love.

Our shipping option for Christmas Delivery is no available. Simply logo to www.gifts.ie, choose from our gift selection and during checkout select ‘Christmas Delivery’. Your products will be reserved and dispatched in mid-December, just in time for Christmas!

Packed full of delicious gourmet treats and awarding winning wines, the new Birchall’s Gift Baskets hampers are now ready to ship! See all hampers now >>

As before the entire range is available in various themed collections, such as our ever-popular classic collection featuring the very best in Irish gourmet foods. See our classic collection hampers >>

Whether for morning breakfast, afternoon tea or Saturday night snacking, our contemporary collection is sure to please any recipient. Also back by popular demand, our updated Chocolicious and Super-Chocolicious baskets.
See our contemporary gift basket collection >>

Our fine wine basket range has increased in variety as we have added some more wonderful wines from around the world. See our wine baskets and gifts>>

• Happy retirement!
• Congratulations on your retirement.
• We’ll miss you.
• Enjoy your retirement. You’ve earned it.
• The best is yet to come.
• Best wishes for your retirement, can I join you?
• This isn’t the end, it’s a new beginning.
• It’s time for you to look back with pride and satisfaction on years well lived and look forward to all the things you’re yet to enjoy!
• Best wishes, now the fun starts!
• In retirement, every day is Boss Day and every day is Employee Appreciation Day, I hope you enjoy every one of them!

While many people believe that Father’s Day is a holiday invented by the fine folks at Hallmark, it’s not so. The celebration of Dad’s special day can most likely be credited to Mrs. John B. Dodd, of Washington State, who first suggested the idea of the holiday in 1909.

Mrs. Dodd’s father, civil war veteran William Smart, was widowed when his wife died in childbirth with their sixth child. Despite the obvious hardships, Mr. Smart proceeded to raise the newborn along with his five other children, by himself.

It wasn’t until Sonora Dodd became an adult that she realized the strength and selflessness her father had shown in raising his children as a single parent. The original date chosen for the holiday was June 5, Mr. Smart’s birthday, however the celebration was postponed until June 19, the third Sunday in June, because there was not enough time to prepare.

At about the same time in various towns and cities across America other people were beginning to celebrate a Father’s Day. Some accounts credit Mrs. Charles Clayton of West Virginia, as the founder of Father’s Day, although most histories give credit to Mrs. Dodd.

In early times, wearing flowers was a traditional way of celebrating Father’s Day. Mrs. Dodd favored the red rose to honor a father still living, while a white flower honored a deceased dad. J.H. Berringer, who also held Father’s Day celebrations in Washington State as early as 1912, chose a white lilac as the Father’s Day Flower.

In 1924 President Calvin Coolidge supported the idea of a national Father’s Day, but it never became official until 1966 when President Lyndon Johnson signed the presidential proclamation that set aside the 3rd Sunday of June as Father’s Day.

Father’s Day falls on June 15th in 2008.