I just wish I had an old-fashioned bathtub for this!

In the Really Cute Gift Ideas Department: you can buy the Learn a Language shower curtain from Urban Outfitters, in your choice of Spanish, French or Japanese!

It is one of the most fun ways I’ve seen to help you learn a language, so it could make a wonderful gift for a bridal shower (literally!) if the bride and groom are off on their honeymoon somewhere in Paris, the French Pacific, Spain, Mexico , South America (minus Brazil), or Japan.

It also might be fun as a novel housewarming present for your twentysomething uni student moving out of home (sob!) for the first time.

I can sooooo see this appealing to a Sagittarius!

I went to a hen’s party last night and gave Mirjana a boxed gift certificate for a LoveStars report (so she can redeem it before next Friday night’s engagement party) and was relieved (as were the others) that there were no tacky phallus-shaped ice-cube trays, drinking straws or other gross-out stuff that I have seen at hen’s parties before.

Anyway I recently discovered one product which looks like good old-fashioned-dirty-clean-fun – if that makes sense(!) for either a brilliant hen’s party, bridal shower or Valentines Day gift idea.

The Doodle Bra is a white lightly padded bra which comes with six non-toxic markers and stencils so you can illustrate your hen’s (or girlfriend’s) bra with whatever drawing (hearts, squiggles, stars, symbols etc) you feel like. Needless to say, it’s a lot more fun to do when she’s wearing it…

For those of you about getting married, this new gift registry could suit you like a 10-carat ring from Tiffany’s.

While it’s not the first online gift registry to let you add items from any store, nor probably to allow you to donate to charity nor even to request cash gifts (which is uh, difficult to do at the best of times), It’s My Gift Registry is the first gift registry I’ve seen that also provides free party planning features for hosting low-key weddings, bridal showers, baby showers, or birthdays at home, etc.

The Party Checklist lets your guests see everything from your gift (wish)list,  to checking off the food and drinks they’ll be bringing. Which certainly stops those awkward now-we’ve-got-7-barbecue-chickens-and-no-salads dilemmas and lets you know if your Nigella Lawson-level cooking buddy will be bringing her famous cupcakes or not.

Draw a Venn diagram of all the people you know, with you at the centre. It would probably look like a flower with all your friends, clients, colleagues, relatives, sport team members, golf buddies, church friends etc as the little petals you know.

So there’s gonna be some groups of people who’ll just never meet your other people – right? Fantastic!

When you’re the only common denominator, if you give them a gift, they’ll be none the wiser if you also happened to give that exact same thing to someone else, such as for a christening, housewarming or 21st.

If so, you might want to consider buying gifts in bulk! Simply type in “bulk lot” on eBay and you’ll be amazed what you can find.

Are a few of your girlfriends having babies all at the same time? Come pre-armed to those baby showers with a babysuit, socks, singlets or little shoes.

Got endless kids’ parties that you have to come bearing gifts? You’ll find sets of little girls’ fairy style necklaces, Lego sets and kids’ books for a steal.

Is it coming up to housewarming season? Buy a bulk lot of beeswax pillar candles, serving platters or magazine baskets.

Have you got more kitchen teas and bridal showers than you can poke a stick at? Save money with bulk purchases of tea towels, cooking utensils or coffee table books.

Are you alarmed at the number of 16th, 18th or 21st birthday gifts you’re expected to buy for your nieces, neighbours and daughters of work colleagues? You can buy Pandora beads in bulk to start them off with their own bracelets.

Even if you don’t like the idea of buying bulk, did you know you can buy giftwrap in bulk? An average sheet at the newsagent costs about $4.95 but if you buy it from a florist wholesaler (which sells a sea of retail supplies including paper, candles, baskets, silk flowers and so on), you could buy about 100 sheets of gloss wrap, cellophane, tissue paper or that funny reconstituted paper for around $29 – or about $0.29 per sheet. With the money you’ll save on gifts, you’ll be wrapt.