I started thinking about how we cope with the holidays, especially Christmas when I read Arthur’s post Friday about the ways he and his wife save money - including not buying Christmas gifts for each other and the extended family drawing names, and then in the comments this from Kimberly:

“Oh those Holidays can really break you if your not careful. We do draw names, for the extended family (*nieces,nephews,sisters,brothers etc). We have two drawings : one for the children with a set dollar limit. The other for the adults with a dollar limit BUT with a catch, making it a frugal game of sorts. The object of the game is to spend the least amount of the set dollar limit - with a gift at the highest value possible. YUP that’s right, we started this a few years back. We have so much fun, trying to find that perfect gift for the least amount of money - at thrift stores, garage sales or whatever. Then we all sit around with our price tags attached and look to see who did the best for their money. It’s really a lot of fun. AND you would be surprised of the treasures we have found for little to ‘no’ money.”

(what an awesome idea - a frugal gift exchange!)

My husband’s family has always done “big” Christmas. Whereas in my family even though we didn’t draw names we never really did a “big” Christmas, as far as gifts were concerned. Mind you, we might have invited half the church, a dozen neighbors and any of the family that was close over for Christmas dinner but we didn’t get or give expensive gifts. The first Christmas Hubby and I spent together was a bit of culture shock for me.

None of us are exceedingly wealthy and in fact one of my brother-in-law’s is a pastor and the other one is self-employed with some good years and some not so good years. We spent the first few years of our marriage buying toys and spending money so we’ve been strapped the past couple years while we try to get our finances back on track and get out of debt (we’re over 1/2 way there - not counting the house!!!). So basically nobody has extra money but they still try to continue the “big” Christmas tradition. To make it work I start Christmas shopping in January.

Actually - I buy birthday presents for each person on the list and then look for their Christmas present. Here is a little breakdown of who I’m buying for and the value amount of the gift we try to do for them:

Our Parents

• $560 total ($120 each for Hubby’s Dad & Stepmom and for My Dad and Stepmom, then $80 combined for my Birthmother and her husband)
  • Except for my Birthmother and her husband that’s $40 for each holiday - Birthday, Father’s Day/Mother’s Day, Christmas. My Birthmother’s birthday is in May so I normally try to do one nicer gift for her birthday and Mother’s Day combined then we try to do a nice joint gift at Christmas.
  • We ignore anniversaries for the most part - this year was my parents 25th anniversary so we did do something for that as well.
    

Our Siblings - 5 sisters, 2 brother-in-laws

• $560 total
  • Hubby’s siblings and their spouses - $20 each for birthdays and Christmas
  • My sisters - $40 each for birthdays and Christmas. As my sister’s get married we’ll treat them like we do Hubby’s sisters - the amount we spend won’t change it will just be spread between more people. However, my sisters and I have already talked about it and as they get married or even just get out of college and out on their own we will probably start drawing names.

Our Nieces and Nephews - we have 6, but as you’ll see below we’re only buying for 5

• $400 Total
  • Once again that is $40 each for birthday and again for Christmas
  • Until last year it was $480, our oldest nephew got married and so we’ve basically dropped him off the gift list. Last year we did send them a $15 value gift for their first Christmas (picture coasters of all their cousins on our side of the family) and if they are ever with us at Christmas for the gift exchange we would do a $20 value combined gift.

Miscellaneous People:

• This really varies - but here are some of the consistent people we do things for
• there is one sweet older couple in our church that we discipled when they first started coming to church and they always get us gifts so we do something for them as well.
• one of my Aunts and I exchange small gifts - often it is books that we’ve read and would exchange anyway we just wrap them up on the holidays instead
• I always do something for my Grandmother at Christmas and often at her birthday - she doesn’t need anything but is very frugal and enjoys pretty things so I look for lace shawls, cut glass vases (and have her caretaker pick up some flowers for it), or I’ll make her something. She also likes to read so we exchange books some too
• My best friend and I do things for each other randomly once or twice a year
• On the rare occasion that I see my Step-Grandparents around Christmas we’ll do something for them
• We always have our Christmas Day gift exchange at my in-law’s house and there are a few older people in the church who are alone at Christmas that we invite and I always do something small for them too.
• I always do something small for my neighbors, clients and a few of our hunting and dog training buddies. Usually it’s homemade cookies, candy, breads and things like that.

Miscellaneous Events:

• Graduations
• Birthday/Anniversary parties for people we wouldn’t normally buy for
• Weddings/Bridal Showers
• Baby Showers

Also needs to be considered - My Sunday School Class: (all of these expenses are split with my co-teacher)

• Quarterly Prizes
• Birthday Presents
• Promotion Presents
• Christmas Presents
• Crafts for them to make for their parents - Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Christmas

Finally - the three of us

• This is fluid, we’re still working on it.

All in all - that’s a very overwhelming list, and if we actually spent that much it would be over $2000 a year. However - remember that all those dollar amounts are value not actual money spent and it gets better! Also for the past couple of years we’ve been able to fudge on the lower end of that “value” number so that has helped a lot too.

I still have some shopping to do but I’m well on my way to being finished. I shop this way so that I can find deals and save money. For example I bought one of my sister-in-law’s a pair of Ghinger sewing scissors for her birthday - they exceed the “value” limit we have because retail is around $50 but I only paid $14 for the scissors. So she’ll get those for her birthday and then something small, possibly homemade at Christmas. Back in April or May I bought Lil Sugar’s first birthday present - value $100-$150 depending on where you get it, I paid $30 and have just stored it - her birthday is in September.

This post is getting long so I’m going to wrap it up for now, but I’ll get the camera out and take some pictures and over the next few Wednesday’s I’ll show you some of the deals I’ve picked up and explain how to shop for holiday’s a year in advance - what to watch out for, what to avoid, what is good to get. Also I’ll be talking about getting a group of people together to buy a gift and exchanging homemade gifts or gifts of time. If you have any questions leave them in the comments and I’ll do my best to answer them for you.

Posted: 07|30|08 at 7:41 am. Filed under: Time Saving Tips.
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