Nov 13 2008
It’s Going to be a Frugal Christmas!
This year will definitely be a frugal Christmas for this family. The economy is in the tank, and I really think that right now we should be paying down credit cards and saving money more than buying an enormous amount of toys that the kids will never play with. We are also in the process of putting a modular on some land and we still need about $400 for permits (the lawyer fees for transferring the land were over $1000 and that wiped our savings out). So, it will be a credit-less Christmas this year.
We have three kids: a 10 year old buy, 2 year old girl and 1 year old boy. We have budgeted out $100 for each kid. For our little girl, we have gotten a few things. I would have LOVED to have gotten her one of those play kitchen, but that wasn’t in the budget for this year. We are getting our 10 year old an MP3 Player and I am getting MP3s through Pepsi Points. Right now I have enough to get him about 7 songs! We are also looking at getting him a cheap digital camera since I found a Star Wars one on sale at Toys R Us for $20. We will probably also be getting him some DVDs or games. Kungfu Panda came out this week, so we will get that for the kids. For the little guy, we haven’t gotten him anything yet because the stuff we bought a few weeks ago for him will be presents for his birthday later this week.
My husband and I have decided not to swap gifts, though I will believe that when I see it. My husband likes to spoil me. We have already gotten presents for just about everybody in my family already. A lot of those presents were bought on clearance earlier in the year. I do have to buy my mom something and I was thinking she would like a digital camera. I am going to ask my sister if she wants to pay for half. For my mom-in-law, I am making a framed scrapbook page of the kids. I gave one to my husband’s grandmother, and his mom was quite jealous, even though I insisted that hers would be coming at Christmas. My dad is getting a coat, my brothers are getting shaving sets I found for $5 each and the women are getting slippers and really nice gloves that I got on clearance last spring for $3. I will also make cookies and fudge for everybody. All in all, I think we will be spending less than $400 this year and will not be putting any on credit cards!!!
So, are you trimming down on Christmas? What are you doing to cut costs?
