Expensive looking Christmas gift ideas for a few bucks....

Our family likes to give homemade gifts.
They are priceless when you consider the time & love that go into them! Not everyone has the time, talent or patience to do it either!

I've been making Kahlua to give at Christmas for years. Now that a couple of people in the family have to be gluten free, they appreciate the gf Kahlua that I make even more. Haven't found that in a store yet!
My sister makes great wine, jelly, jam, candy & soap.

Back in the 80's, when everyone we knew was laid off from work & on unemployment, we said only handmade gifts & nothing more than a few dollars. We wanted to see what we could come up with that was nice, but cost hardly anything! We all had lots of time but no money!

We all still talk about it. It was so much fun!
That was the best Christmas that we ever had!
My sister made Christmas tree decorations, crocheted slipper socks & neck warmers, made doll furniture from leftover pieces of plastic canvas & yarn, canned soup & made soap.

Hubby made our son & nephew race tracks for their Matchbox cars from leftover scraps of wood & plywood that he had. Made a circle track with bridges & overpasses. Then added trees & little animals that he got in a bag at the craft store for a buck. He carved little buildings out of blocks of wood & even made road signs!

The boys are 42 & 36 now & they still have the tracks! Our nephew said his friends were so jealous! They got expensive, plastic, electric tracks that either broke or burned out in a few weeks!

Our extended family has gotten so big now, that we draw names & exchange gifts. We still have a price limit though & when we write our names on the piece of paper, we add a few gift suggestions. It really helps avoid buying stuff for buying's sake!

I always appreciate an Amazon gift certificate! I've given gc's for the greenhouse to the gardeners in the family. Last year my sister gave me one for Goodwill! I was so excited! I didn't know they had them. We like to look for antiques & repurpose/reinvent things, but I don't have time to yard sale much anymore, so that was perfect!

We have given local honey, maple syrup & homemade sauerkraut. Make up a basket or use a mixing bowl & put in a kitchen towel, maple syrup, pancake ingredients or even a mix, a pancake turner, measuring cup etc.

For kids, a DVD with some snacks.
Really, you are only limited by your imagination.
And that is part of the fun! Also great for birthday or shower gifts. I keep a notebook all year & when anyone mentions something they like or are into, it gets written in the book.
Their favorite color, foods, writers, singers...
Then when I need gift ideas I check the book.
It really takes the stress off!
And people are really impressed that you were paying attention & remembered what they like!

Holidays shouldn't be something to dread. And they shouldn't be financially draining either!
How did we get so far off track to begin with & buy into everything being so commercialized?
Even Halloween now, with all the store costumes.
I remember all the fun we had with our kids, coming up with our own costumes!
But that could be a whole 'nother thread!!!

WOQ

My aunt was battling cancer a couple of years ago and simply asked that everyone in the family make ornaments for her tree that were reflective of the family.

So for our contribution, we made a set of four that incorporated my husband's origami skills, my crochet skills, and our son colored on the paper my husband folded. My aunt took the ornaments everyone made and puts them on her tree to this day.

a reply to: Atsbhct

I totally support the knock off industry. The criminals are not the knock- offers, it's the big corporations which think they can totally scam people, then big bro just turns a blind eye because they're getting their tax money from those sales. It's a scam...

Like look at this....

If you make a wallet for .50 cents. That's actually how much it costs to make that louis Viutton wallet. Then they resell it for say $5,000. That's 1 million% mark up. .50 cents to 5bucks would be 1000%; to 50 bucks is 10,000 to 500 is 100,000% and to 5,000 buck is 1 million percent. (now I can't say for sure I got that math right but I'm pretty sure.)

I don't agree with that. That's a scam. The US law even says that everything should have a "fair market value", not a scam value that's been way over inflated. That's the definition of a scam. I don't know how they get away with it.

a reply to: AugustusMasonicus

ok purse

a reply to: TerryDon79

ya I see that, okay 10 million % ha ha. I guess at that point you have so much money coming in that you use it for toilet paper. I've had lots of money in the past. I was rich once, but now I'm basically poor. So I now very very much have learned to appreciate the value of money. Basically if you go broke you become a cheapo. That's how life goes.

originally posted by: bigpatato
ok purse

Well, that makes it much more acceptable. You can put your Pomeranian in there.

a reply to: DBCowboy

that's a great idea