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Christmas is around the corner, and we're just as excited as you are! One of the most exciting things about Christmas is exchanging gifts with family, friends and loved ones.
In the spirit of giving, we've curated a list of affordable Christmas gift ideas that do not require you to break the bank to show your loved ones how much you care for them.
Before we start, it is important to tailor these gift ideas to the peculiarities of each person you'll be gifting this Christmas. You do not want to make the mistake of giving a memory scrapbook to someone who has no care for them!
Here's our list of affordable or cheap Christmas gift ideas that help you save money:
Almost everyone has a new year's resolution at the beginning of every year. Studies have shown that journaling or taking notes of our daily activities helps keep track of our progress. You can make a yearly planner by buying a small notebook with a plain back cover, numbering each page according to the days in the year and including motivational quotes on some pages. This gift shows you're interested in the recipient's personal development, and you devoted time to handcrafting a gift. Best of all, it shouldn't cost more than £5.
Photographs remind us of beautiful moments shared together and can also be a source of inspiration later in the year. You can print out a nice picture of you and the person you are gifting and fix it in a picture frame that can be bought for less than £5. As an alternative, you may print out an inspirational quote that you think would inspire the recipient.
Having a memory scrapbook as a Christmas present could be very well appreciated, especially considering the circumstances of this year where most countries have undergone some form of lockdown and physical meetings have been limited. Your memory scrapbook may include photographs taken together, transport tickets to a place you both visited, printouts of your online chats and any other thing that holds as memorabilia. You only need to spend money on a notebook, glue and colour pens. You could also make a digital memory scrapbook by taking pictures of the contents of a physical memory scrapbook and making it into a video.
As a Christmas gift, you could give your time and energy to help your loved ones. Activities such as babysitting, grocery shopping and even mowing the lawn could make good Christmas presents. By doing this, you save them the stress of carrying out these activities by themselves, and you also save the money you'd have spent on a gift.
If you have a garden, no need to worry anymore about expensive Christmas gifts. You could pick out fresh and finely scented flowers from your garden and give them as a Christmas present. Flowers serve as a form of home decoration and also you won't have to spend a penny since they're from your garden. If you don't have a garden, you can buy cheap house plants to give your loved ones.
This is a perfect gift for a music lover, and it comes at zero cost. All you have to do is be observant of their best artists, best songs, or music genre and put them together in a playlist. This gift shows efforts in understanding the preference of the recipient. Alternatively, you could add your favourite songs to a playlist and share it with your loved ones. Every time they listen to the playlist, they'd be thinking of you.
If there is a particular item that the recipient of your Christmas gift has consistently borrowed from you and you can afford to part with it, you could make it their Christmas gift. With this, you don't spend any money, and you make them happy.
Give someone the gift of something you cooked. All you need to do is add extra portions while making your own food and present it as a Christmas gift. You save money by buying ingredients to make the food in bulk.
For people who love to cook or are enthusiastic about cooking, you could search for interesting recipes on the internet and write them down in a notebook with colourful pens. This would only cost you a notebook and a few pens. Those shouldn't be more than £5!
If you have a group of friends and you want to save money on Christmas gifts, you can organise a virtual Christmas party where everyone can interact, play online games and have an excellent time. This might cost you some time, but it should be worth it!
Tote bags are quite handy and are becoming very common. You could take them as grocery bags or even as handbags for a casual outing. Tote bags are included on this list because they are easy to make, and you may not have to buy any materials to make them. All you need is any piece of clothing or fabric you're no longer using, a needle and some thread. Search for videos on YouTube on how to make tote bags, and voila! You have a Christmas present to give out.
Just like we mentioned in our last blog post, coupons are an excellent way to reduce your shopping bills. You could check for available coupons in newspapers and websites of the stores the recipient of your gift likes best. Collect them in an envelope and present them as a Christmas gift.
We hope you use one or several of these gift ideas this Christmas. If you are interested in eco-friendly and sustainable gift ideas, have a look at this list.
And that's a wrap! If you enjoyed reading this post, please let us know by leaving a comment below! Also, you can be a part of a much bigger conversation here - join our community!
Every month, we’ll send you The Plug - a curation of the best personal finance content in the UK. We share real-life stories, how-to guides, top personal finance news, popular community questions, and tips to help you stay on top of your money.
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