Happy holidays!
Posted on December 26, 2007 4 Comments
I’m back from a self-imposed holiday hiatus. While you might think I was using the time to recharge my batteries, the holidays proved to be as crazy – and busy – as ever. I’ve been running all over Chicago buying gifts for everyone I can think of, baking cookies and wrapping presents and attending family and social events for the past week and a half. Seriously, where does the time go?
Now that it’s over, I want to share with you some money-saving tips I employed this year, as well as some that I missed out on.
Tip 1) Get your adult family to agree to a gift swap. This year, on my mom’s side, everybody who wanted to receive a gift brought a $20 gift for an exchange. This was the most fantastic idea ever. Last year I spent tons of time and money buying the perfect gifts for aunts, uncles and cousins. And truthfully, though I like to open gifts as much as the next person, I really don’t need anything extravagant for myself. The gift swap solution worked perfectly. We arrived at my aunt’s house and put all the gifts in the center of the room; then each participant got a number. They picked gifts from the pile in order of the numbers, and each participant had the initial option to ‘steal’ a gift from someone else. In the end, everyone ended up with a really nice gift. I think you’d be AMAZED at what you can get for $20 that can apply to a guy or girl. Among the gifts:
- A wine chiller and bottle of wine
- A fuzzy movie-watching blanket
- A leather charging station for phones, iPods, etc.
- Popcorn bowl, popcorn and blockbuster gift cards
- A desktop reed diffuser and candy jar (which I took for my office and am enjoying as I type)
- Family games
- Gift certificates
The list goes on. Anyway, it was a lovely time and probably the best idea for saving money that we’ve had in years.
Tip 2) Buy small, thoughtful gifts. For a few cousins, I always buy something small (under $10) that tells them I’m thinking of them without breaking the bank. It has to be something useful and not craptastic, though! Last year, I bought bottles of wine in bulk. This year, I bought glass ornaments that only cost about $3.00 each, but were still beautiful. And for my aunts and uncles, I bought Garrett’s popcorn bags from downtown (Chicago) at about $4.00 each. All were very well received!
Tip 3) Double up for big gifts. My mom and I teamed up to buy my dad a laptop this year. And, my mom and I also teamed up to buy each other plane tickets to Houston to visit a cousin. My brothers also teamed up to buy my holiday gifts.
Tip 4) Splurge on loved ones. It’s OK to go big every once in a while. Just make sure it’s within your means (you don’t ever have to buy gifts on credit) and that it actually means something to you and/or them. Buying big for the sake of buying big is not what we’re about here!
Tip 5) Be credit aware. If you can’t pay it100 percent of your gifts on your January credit statement, think twice before buying such a big load. Are there smaller gifts your family can enjoy?
Tip 5) Save receipts. I put all my Christmas receipts in an envelope marked with the date for easy retrieval. You wouldn’t believe how many returns are simplified when all the receipts are in the same place.
Now for one strategy I missed…
Tip 6) Think ahead. When buying clothes, sometimes it’s better to buy something small, like a T-shirt, and give a nice gift card so that person can redeem the value during post-holiday sales. Last night (Christmas) J.Crew was offering 20 percent off their already lowered sales prices! You can get probably twice the merchandise for the same cost during post-holiday sales.
Overall, I had a very nice Christmas. I didn’t break the bank, spent lots of time with my family and gave and received heartfelt gifts, including a crock pot, which I am sure will be very comical as I try out recipes this week. On a side note, I also am learning to drive, so this year I had the added bonus of being able to drive to and from my parents’ house. Hopefully a drivers’ license will soon follow. That would be a wonderfully self-empowering holiday gift 
Cheers!
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4 Responses to “Happy holidays!”
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December 27th, 2007 @ 7:00 pm
Garrett;s popcorn…mmmmmm. Did you mix the caramel and cheese? Yummy.
Happy New Year.
December 28th, 2007 @ 4:58 am
Yep. It’s the best way to eat it
January 4th, 2008 @ 6:18 pm
I am particularly fond of your tip to plan ahead. I find that if I look for neat gift ideas all year long, then when we start to lead into the holidays I have much less stress… not to mention diminished strain on the wallet! It is rapidly becoming my only insurance for getting through the holidays in one piece, and it happens all year long.
Jerry
http://www.leads4insurance.com
February 6th, 2009 @ 2:07 am
Great tutorial! Very informative in how well worded and descriptive you were! You know they say that if one knows how to describe what they want really well, then life is just as good as how you describe it
Its great for people who feel like time is running against them and then land on your blog and feel like a whole burden was just lifted off of their shoulder.. I admire and respect people who take time to make it easier for others.. Thanks a bunch!