Frugal Ideas For Christmas Gifts

This page will give you more frugal ideas for Chrismas gifts on a budget.

It is possible to buy some frugal Christmas decorations from the thrift and pound stores, but even then you can end up still spending quite a bit. I’ve always enjoyed making a lot of my own decorations for the house and the tree; it can also be fun to get others involved too. After all isn’t Christmas meant to be about togetherness? Here are some frugal ideas on how to make your own decorations.

• Decorate a bowl with leaves and rolled up shiny sweet wrappers to represent berries and fill with either winter fruit or potpourri. This makes a lovely centrepiece to any table.

  picture by c0reyann

• Find pinecones and spray them with silver or gold paint or sprinkle them with glitter. Great for tree decorations or just decorating shelves

• If you have an old party dress that you no longer want, a good frugal way to use it is to cut it up and make little bows to decorate chair corners or to tie to the branches of your tree.

• Decorate plain white candles with ribbons, twisted leaves or shiny paper. But remember these candles are for decoration only and should not be used.

• Door wreaths can be made using dried orange and lemon peel, holly, red berries, glitter and shiny rolled up sweet wrappers glued onto thick cardboard. These look great when placed on interior doors throughout the house.

• Dough ornaments are great fun and are great to hang on the tree. Mix 2 cups of flour and half a cup of salt with water to make soft dough. Be creative and use cutters to make stars or make into twists or even mould into fruit shapes.

  Use a toothpick to make a hole if you intend to hang the ornament and leave it in whilst baking. Baking time is 2 hours at 250F and turn if needed and bake for 1 more hour until hard. Once cooled they can be painted, covered in glitter or sprayed.

• Cover tablemats with wrapping paper to add a Christmassy feel to the dinner table. I love frugal ideas like this, so simple but so efffective.

• Paper chains are easy to make and are a must for a frugal Christmas. You can either buy the strips of pre-glued paper cheaply at discount stores or cut strips from colourful magazines.

These are just some do it yourself Christmas decoration ideas, I’m sure many of you have your own frugal ideas and suggestions for making decorations. Why not share them with us and help make Christmas time even more colourful and fun for everyone on a budget. Send your suggestions here.

Frugal Ideas For Christmas cards and wrapping paper.

I get a real bee in my bonnet every year when I think about all the money wasted, not to mention the waste of resources, on Christmas cards and wrapping paper.

Even if you buy your cards in bulk they can still work out quite expensive if you have lots of people to send to.

When you think that most people simply throw paper and cards away after the holidays, it really does seem like a terrible waste.

A great tip for reusing your old Christmas cards, especially cards which have a horizontal picture, is to save them every year and then instead of sending everyone a Christmas card, send them a Christmas postcard.

Simply cut off the back of the card and write your message on one side of the reverse and their postal address on the other side. This will not only save you money but will also be something different for your friends and family to receive.

Wrapping paper can also be expensive and is discarded immediately once the present has been opened.

Why not buy some inexpensive brown paper on a roll and decorate it your self using children’s paint, sponges, cut-outs or make a collage of pictures of Christmassy things cut from magazines.

Free Gifts - Give your time, a great frugal living little extra

Of course one of the most expensive outlays at Christmas time is gift buying. If you're really stuck for something to buy someone, or you really don’t want to spend much, then why not give the gift of your time?

FREE DOWNLOADABLE GIFT COUPONS I have created some Free Downloadable Fun Gift Coupons for you to cut out and place inside a card, for a free gift that will put a smile on anyone’s face.

Continued - Page One - More Frugal Christmas Ideas