Making the Most of Our Christmas Tree

This year we decided to cut down our own Christmas tree.  We haven't done that since Princess' first Christmas.  We certainly ended up paying for the experience, as we don't have any friends or land of our own to go cut one down on.  The experience was well worth it, but I like to get the most for my dollar.  So I'm going to attempt to take the needles from our lovely balsam fir and make them into draft stoppers.  My goal is to try to make 2 for us as well as some for gifts next year.  Maybe if they come out well, I might even try to make a few to sell.  I found general directions to start with:  see it on Pinterest here.  I am sure I will make my own variation once I get to the actual sewing part.  Putting the money spent on the Christmas tree toward saving money on heat, sounds great to me!  What do you spend money on that you can in turn use to save money in another area?

Christmas Aftermath

We hope you all had a wonderful Christmas!  Ours was great, even with working around the weather.  Now that it is over we have started preparing for next Christmas.  Yep, that's right we've already started.  I have gone through all the bags, bows and tissue paper and packed away all of it that is still nice.  No sense to spend tons of money just on the wrapping!  This year a lot of the good sales started before Christmas.  We went to Michaels right before Christmas when they were running the 75% off sale and picked up photo ornaments (they make great grandparent gifts!), some wreath decorations (we went with a fake wreath this year to try to cut back on expense), scrap booking stickers, ornaments for Princess to paint and give out for gifts next year, a lemax house and few odds and ends for the Colonel's train set up that the kids love.  We went to Walmart and got the Colonel a shirt ($2.47 for an xxl!), gift tags that are perfect for the kids learning to write, bows, a few ornaments,  another piece for the train, a window cling,  bath paint for the kids, candles, a gift set, a chapstick gift set.  We went to Toys R Us and The Children's Place to get Christmas shirts for the kids and one of their cousins for next year.  Some of these will be birthday gifts and some will be put away until Christmas next year.  But by buying it now at at least half off if not more, it really makes a big difference in stretching our Christmas budget.  Too help even more I had been saving up my swagbucks and redeemed them for a $25 Walmart giftcard.  I put that toward my after Christmas sale shopping which helped us save even more!  What are some of your best frugal living tips for Christmas??

DIY Christmas Card Holder

Christmas is by far one of my favorite times of year. I like to be able to see all of the Christmas cards that we receive so finding the right way to display them can be a challenge.  Most Christmas card holders that I've seen end up having the cards all covering each other.  So I went to Michaels and found some garland and clothespins.  The garland I picked has the plastic chain inside it.  I took the clothespins and painted them green to help them look like the leaves on a poinsettia and blend in a little better.  Then I hung the garland up (Ours actually worked out to be two garlands) and used the clothespins to attach the cards.  It displays the cards very nicely and was not overly expensive.