“It’s the most wonderful time of the year”, according to Andy Williams. It’s also the most expensive and often the most stressful too. It often feels like the entire year is taken up with preparing for, or recovering from, Christmas celebrations. The months leading up to it are fraught with slowly-building panic and anticipation, and by the time we reach January we are fretting over whether our finances will be in order in time for the next Christmas onslaught.
Here I am going to give you a few tips and ideas to minimize financial stress over the Christmas season, hopefully allowing you to relax and enjoy it a little more than usual!
Buy In Advance!
The most well-organized people among us do their Christmas shopping months in advance. You don’t have to worry too much about whom the presents are for; just pick up things that could suit a number of your friends or family and start stashing them away for Christmas. This is very useful for shopping for kids, too. Because you, as the parents, are mainly responsible for your kid’s gifts, you can be fairly sure that they won’t acquire another of whatever it is you’ve bought for them in advance. The first few weeks and months straight after Christmas is a great time to do this; often you will be able to pick up attractive gift sets brought out by the stores especially for the festive season for a fraction of their usual price. Gift wrap, Christmas cards and decorations are also available for mere cents just after the main event.
Home-Made Miracles!
Why spend money on expensive decorations for your home when you can do it yourself? There is nothing quite like the rustic charm of beautiful home-made decorations and it’s a wonderful activity for the whole family to enjoy together. Here are some easy and simple ideas for you:
- Paper snowflakes – Decorate square pieces of paper with glitter, before folding up several times into a small square. Cut simple shapes out of the small square, and when you open it up you will be greeted with a beautiful sparkly symmetrical snowflake! Experiment with different ways of cutting the squares, it doesn’t matter if they go wrong because they cost practically nothing to make.
- Paper chains – you can’t go wrong with this old favorite. Cut strips of colored paper (you could get the kids to decorate the paper with paint and glitter first) and glue them together in loops, making a chain that can be hung as a garland around the room.
- Forage! If you are lucky enough to live in the countryside, or if you have access to a public outside space, you can bring a little of the outdoors inside with you. You can collect holly, pine cones, ivy (although not the poison kind!) and other attractive seasonal finds, and use them to make lovely decorations with. Making a wreath is easy and fun once you know how, and finding an online instructional video is easy. You can obtain a preserving spray for your foliage from a local florist if necessary.
- Cookie tree decorations – make a simple cookie dough, cut into Christmassy shapes (stars, Christmas trees, bells etc), bake and decorate with icing and little edible silver beads. Don’t forget to make a hole at the top for the string before you bake them! These also make lovely gifts and cost practically nothing to make.
- Use your greeting cards as decorations! Simply hang up a string horizontally on your wall and hang any cards you receive on it. They will look really pretty up on the walls and really add to the festive atmosphere of your home.
On that note, baking for Christmas gifts is a really thoughtful and kind way to show you care. People really appreciate home made edible gifts at Christmas – lets face it, one of the best things about Christmas is sharing good food with people you love – and with some careful planning it can even be cheaper than buying gifts. It is a lot of work, though, so if you are short on time it may be a good idea to buy some small gifts and bake simple things to complement them.
Save throughout the year.
A little forward planning through the year leading up to Christmas can make the financial strain a lot less. There are lots of companies who can help you save towards the cost of Christmas, and provide you with vouchers and hampers at the end of the term, but it is just as easy to set up your own little Christmas savings fund. Set up a simple, free savings account and decide on an amount to pay into it each week or month. It doesn’t have to be a lot, just a few dollars each week will soon add up. Think about it – if you can just save $5 a week towards the cost of Christmas, starting in February, by December you will have accrued $220! That will certainly ease the financial burden somewhat when the time comes.
Plan your Christmas meal in advance.
The last few grocery shopping days before Christmas are like hell on earth. Planning your meal in advance can help you avoid this last minute rush to the checkout. Prices are often marked right up at this particular time, because the stores know that you will pay it no matter what. Buy things like flour and caster sugar for your baking a few weeks in advance – they will keep for a long time. If you have a freezer, use it! There are certain parts of your Christmas meal that you can prepare a few days in advance and freeze, freeing up your time on the day.
Remember what’s important!
For most of us, Christmas gifts are not what make it a special holiday. It’s about good food, and quality time spent with our loved ones. It’s hard, I know, but try not to spend too much time panicking about budgeting for Christmas. Children only care about getting the biggest and best presents if that’s what they are used to; if you go mad buying big presents for them every year, they will expect more and more each year to come. Not only that, but they will lose sight of what Christmas is really all about. The magic of Christmas has nothing to do with how much money you spend.