OT- Cheap Christmas Ideas

[Cheesecake7]

I am wondering what everyone is doing to save money at Christmas time.  With the economy the way it is, and with me about to pop, I am trying to save money, since I don't have much.  I need something to gvie to the extended members of the family, the aunt's, grandma's etc. My sister in law painted everyone a picture, which saved her bunches, but Im not the most creative....  any ideas?

[KellyA74]

Sure..PM me if the site looks confusing to you....It takes a while to get used to.  I'm just an online ordering freak so it made sense to me!  Esp. all of the baby stuff I ordered.....My nursery furniture was $1200 and I think i got a gift card just for ordered that alone!  And we were going to buy it anyway......

[sweetangel7]

Gift cards are awesome...they are something the receiver can always use!  A lady I work with was trying to tell me about this but you did a much clearer job of explaining it lol  I'll have to check it out!  We still do buy for my mom, grandma, dh's mom, dad and brother...We didn't buy for each other at all last year but we are spending $100 or less on each other this year.  We used to go insane with Christmas!

[kennedydp5]

wow thanks kellya74!!!  :)

[KellyA74]

It's kind of late now but for any of you who order alot of stuff online....from pretty much anywhere.....eBay, QVC, LL Bean, you name it......you need to set up an acct. with MyPoints.com  Everytime you order something you get however many points the store offers per dollar spent and when you get like 6000+ points, you get a free gift card to pretty much wherever you want or 12,000+ points you get a $50 gift card.  For Christmas I've already received 2 $25 Kmart gift cards for my niece and nephew and a $50 LL Bean one for my MIL.  You get Bonus Points emails all the time where you get 5 points for just clicking on a website (I just click then delete it...takes 2 seconds)....and the point rack up fast.
I know this sounds dumb but free gift cards are awesome.....And you can start now for next year or for Bday presents, etc.....

[kennedydp5]

seetangel-  you're not the only one, lol!!!  all the adults in our family (well, the mature ones at least!) understand that its about the kids.  and 4 of them are ours, lol!  dh and i didn't even get each other anything last year except for a couple stocking stuffers.  our parents still get us something but we tell them not to.  i would rather that money be spent on my children rather than on me.  

cheesecake-  a lot of times things that people sell on craigslist are also new and cheaper then you would get in the store.  

[sweetangel7]

Oh...another thing I do (if you feel you have to actually give them something) mostly for co-workers and people who give us an unexpected gift, is I keep a couple bottles of wine on hand in nice gift bags and nice boxes of chocolates.  These are gifts that people can use and be done with...Maybe I'm the only one who has people around them that has kind of made the message clear that they don't need/want anything especially if it is going to take up space etc.  They are all older and trying to get rid of stuff...

[sweetangel7]

Well to be honest, now that all of the 'kids' in my family are having kids we decided to not give gifts to the aunts and uncles...They would rather not have extra things at this point in their life...they are all well off making six figures+...and they would rather all of us spend our money on our babies and mortgages.  We started this last year...all of the 'adults' (my mom and her brothers) decided this would be best...people can only use so many bath sets, mugs, photos etc.  It definitely made Christmas less stressful last year and this year too.  I don't know if this is an option for your family but everyone was really sincere in this decision and it works for us.  It might be too late to start this conversation as Christmas is a month away...

[amy0013]

I just discovered collage photos at both walmart and walgreens . com.  They give you an opportunity to put together up to 20 pictures into a collage...I just did an 8x10 for less than $3.  I'm going to buy a nice frame and VOILA!  Easy present!  :)

[AnitaRFrith]

I get things off ebay.  An I have already found 5 nice bath sets at yard sales.  ( my hubby an i go on weekends some times.)  The people that were selling them were school teachers.   They get so much they sell them.  I paid a few bucks each.  I got some gorgious baby ear rings for my neice too.  They are from macy's an still have the price tag on them.  They cost over 70.00$  in the store.  I got them at a rich lady's sale.  My husband an i spent 10 bucks at the sell we got the ear rings from.  3 bucks on the ear rings, 3 for a working blackberry, an 4 bucks on a digital cameria.  We made over 200$ just by selling the blackberry an cameria.  ( the lady's dad got a new black berry so he didn't want that one.  An the cameria had a problem with the flip out screen that would had cost 80 bucks to fix.  It was a 600$ cameria.) I know I sound SO cheap but my husband is disabled so it helps pay the bills.  I got my husband into it.  He loves to find deals an resale it on ebay.  We have made about 800 to 900$ just this year.  I hope this helps.

[kazwel]

One of the things we are doing this year is having a family picture taken. and we are splitting the cost between us. One of all of us and one of just the kids.  the family picture is for the grandparents and the kids are for the other family members.

Also, if you have to buy toys and gifts for children, KBtoys is having a60% off online sale,  And most of their items have free shipping

Happy Holidays everyone!!