Inexpensive Gift Giving for the Holiday Season

The holiday season is a special time of year. We want to give our families, friends, co workers, neighbors, and of course our children gifts to celebrate the holidays. It can also be stressful trying to find gift ideas that fit your budget. There are many families that are on a tight budget for gift giving. If you have children, their toys alone could almost break the bank. Things are steadily costing more as each year passes making it harder to buy gifts for extended relatives, co workers, neighbors and more. We want to give more but money can often get in the way. However, with a little creativity and a lot of ambition you can make gift giving fun, unique, and less expensive.

Ideas that I have found to be fun, fairly simple, and inexpensive are:

Knit
Learn to knit using the knifty knitter. The knifty knitter is a fun, very easy way to knit using a loom. You can literally make a knitted hat in less than two hours with know knowledge of knitting at all. I suggest a knitted hat and scarf set. There are many options such as a baby blanket, booties, even pillows. A knifty knitter kit which includes 4 different sized round looms can be purchased for around $12.99 at Michaels, Wal-Mart, Target or you can visit provocraft.com. Once you get the knifty knitter and yarn you are set to start making gifts. I would also suggest shopping around for competitive yarn prices to make your gifts even less expensive. I have found great deals on Ebay.

Bake
Banana bread is something I bake yearly and it is a great gift idea for a neighbor or a
Co-worker. I bake several loafs a year and place it in a decorative bag such as this http://www.papermart.com/templates/showimage.asp?PAGE=75020&IMG=../itemimg/jpg_polyprop/75-101-226.jpg .
You can also bake cookies, another type of bread, fudge or whatever your specialty may be.

Pictures
There is a lot you can do with pictures that doesn't cost too much. Take pictures of the family or children. Many families take holiday pictures by the tree or have professional pictures taken. Taking your own pictures will be less expensive and you can get those pictures enlarged and buy a frame and give those as gifts for extended family members. A great site to use to get copies and enlargements and photo gifts is www.shutterfly.com. Calendars are a great option and generally run under $20.00. You can upload a picture for every month of the year. Coffee mugs can also have photos added to them.

Gift Baskets
Gift baskets are a wonderful gift. They can be quite expensive if you purchase them pre made. You can make a gift basket for a fraction of the costs in addition to placing a more personalized touch to it. If you have a teenage girl to buy for a make up basket would be a great gift for her. Try www.eyeslipsface.com where all make-up is $1.00. You can make a basket and place your own baked goods and add a great coffee with a mug. There are many options out there just use what you know about the recipient and get started.

Felted Soap & Soap making
I recently was introduced to this idea and think it is a fun, easy, and different type of gift idea. Step by step instructions can be found here http://www.mielkesfarm.com/felt_soap.htm. Making regular soap if you didn't want to make felted soap would also be a great option. For instructions on how to make soap visit this web site http://www.grandpapencil.com/activity/giftsoap.htm.

Another great idea that my daughter and I have recently enjoyed is making handmade gift tags. They are easy to make and can be fun for your children to help with. Here is a helpful article I used. http://www.hgtv.com/hgtv/crafting/article/0,1789,HGTV_3352_1541688,00.html

Last but not least you can also make your own gift bags. Making gift bags are more complex than the other items here have been. If you are interested you can find detailed instructions here:
http://www.janome.com/project_show.php?id=120

No matter what your budget you can use some of these ideas and give great gifts that will be much appreciated by whoever the recipient may be. These gifts are hand made or customized by you which will put that special personal touch on everything given. People will appreciate the time and effort put in by making them these special gifts. The holiday season can be too commercial and incorporating individually made, well thought out gifts can make it feel more meaningful.