Hey Friend
When I think about all the money spent on Christmas,  the amount of gifts and stuff that is added to each household, and the thought of the small percent of those items that are even used or enjoyed, it makes me cringe!  
 
I am not the best gift giver because I am so practical, but when I was a young mom with small kids trying to buy gifts just to have something for everyone even though we didn’t have much of a Christmas budget, I realized that this is not how Christmas was suppose to be.
The hustle and bustle of getting gifts for people in hopes they will like them and then finding time to do the dreaded job of wrapping them(thank goodness my teenagers enjoy doing that now!) and if they were like me-they probably didn’t even use the gift and it would eventually be put into a donation box so it wasn’t just taking up space in our home.
We never went into debt because we were too poor to have credit cards, but we did eat alot of cheap meals to save extra money in October, November, and December ~even more than the normal frugal meals, but I don’t think the kids really even noticed!
 
Throughout the years, we have changed the way we do things and made the Christmas Season all around much simpler and a whole lot cheaper. We do alot of baking because we enjoy doing that this time of the year, so we make up small plates of goodies to give people instead of gifts. If you don’t bake, buy a  variety of goodies and split them up into different plates to give. 
Fruit baskets are always great too!  Usually much cheaper if you make your own!  If we have families that we give to, we will do a little basket of hot cocoa with a few different toppings such as crushed andes mints or candy canes, mini chocolate chips, marshmallows, toffee bits, caramel sauce and redi whip and you know that will get used because it is a nice cozy treat when you live somewhere cold like we do!!!! 
The simpler you keep the season, the more you are going to enjoy it and it is alot less stress when you are able to stay in your budget.  I think sometimes people end up buying gifts for people just because they have always done it and probably don’t realize the other person would be happy to lessen their gift giving as well!  Just talk to the other families if they want to do things differently!  More and More people are moving toward simplicity and minimalism and most would be happy to have less stuff to find a place for and keep organized. 
See you back next week!  Make sure to join our free Facebook group below for the NO SPEND JANUARY Challenge!
 
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Have a fabulous week!
Monica