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It is not too late to plan a great Valentine’s Day! Head over to Eternal Spiral Books to get some great ideas on how to celebrate Valentine’s Day.

Although you have probably already spent a lot plenty for the holidays, December still has some bargains worth taking advantage of. There are still some discount-priced foods and consumer goods to be had, and don’t forget to use loyalty cards with the stores, and coupons.

Make your holiday dinners extra-special by taking advantage of these December deals at your grocery store:

✴ Dairy, such as butter and cheese
✴ Breads, like ready-made dough, dinner rolls and pie crusts
✴ Dessert items, such as cake mixes, icings, refrigerated cookie dough, pie filling
✴ Baking supplies, like yeast, sugar, flours, chocolate chips, spices, nuts, baking chocolate
✴ Ham
✴ Sweet potatoes
✴ Mushrooms
✴ Pears
✴ Tangerines
✴ Soda pop

You’ll enjoy some fantastic deals on a variety of consumer goods, given the time of year. Watch for big discounts on toys, tools and electronics. Plan to buy extra paper products for the kitchen. Make it a point to explore incredible savings at your local big box stores on the following goods:
✴ Toys
✴ Tools
✴ Gift cards
✴ Electronics, including computers
✴ Plastic wrap
✴ Aluminum foil
✴ Disposable bake ware
✴ Winter clothing, including coats

Did you know that you can also enjoy fantastic buys on wedding attire and home theater equipment this month? Save on these specially-priced items and watch your local sales circulars for even more in December.
Shop only the sales, and don’t forget to hit the after Christmas sales for anything you were putting off buying until you could get the bargain price.

Hint: If it is bright red, consider it as a gift for Valentine’s Day in a few weeks!

Shop smarter, live better, save big. That should be your resolution for 2012. Happy holidays, everyone!

The best way to save money at the holidays is to be honest with yourself and others about what you can and can’t afford. Don’t burden yourself with debt, or feel guilty if you don’t have much or indeed any money for the holidays.

The holidays seem to be synonymous with gifts, parties, food and alcohol. But not that long ago in England, the Christmas stockings hung from the mantelpiece by the fire were considered stuffed to the brim if there was an orange and a sixpence in them (about a dime).

We are not sure how things have become so commercialized in the past few decades, but with the current economic recession still biting hard, this year is the right time to get back to basics. For example, do you really need to buy a gift for everyone in the family? Or more than one gift per person. Is quality important, or quantity?

Each family will have to decide these things for themselves, but it is important to ask the question. If you have a large family, can you do a Secret Santa in order to just gift to one? Or can all the adults agree that Christmas this year will just be for the children, and that they get to ask for a list of three things and Santa will be bringing them one as a surprise?
(Continued in Part 2)

Success Strategies for Saving Money at the Holidays, Part 2

Continued from Part 1
You can create a lot of family fun without having to spend a lot on food and alcohol. If you do want to indulge yourself by going out for a meal or drinks, don’t starve yourself all day in preparation for a feast. Also don’t buy a lot of expensive and watered down drinks. Your friends might consider taking turns hosting and getting in cases of beer from the warehouse club, or larger bottles of wine. In many cases the whole bottle will be cheaper than what you are paying for one glass of wine in a restaurant.

Have a potluck holiday supper in which everyone brings a dish, or you assign people appetizer, main course, sides and so on. You can provide all the cutlery and drinks or have everything bring a bottle or six pack and you provide the tableware, glasses and desserts.

Make do with the decorations you already have, or get some free resources online and use crayons, colored pencils and whatever else you already have in the house to make your own decorations with the children. Spend time using the toys that the kids got last year for the holidays and probably have not played with since.

In fact, one great way to spend early December planning for the holidays is to take the time to start clearing out things in your house and especially in each child’s room and start gathering all the things that you and the children don’t use or have outgrown.

If they are decent quality, put them on sale at eBay or donate them to the Salvation Army and be sure to get a receipt. Then look on their website to calculate the values for the items and deduct those amounts from your taxes next April.

Use the money you earn on eBay or the money you save on your taxes as the foundation for next year’s Christmas savings account. Don’t feel pressured to spend what you don’t have. Practice saying, “I can’t afford it,” or “If we want it, we have to save up for it.”

Also be sure to revise your Christmas list in light of what you find as you do your holiday cleaning and sorting. You may find yourself crossing a lot of items off the list.

Try to stick to practical gifts for your loved ones, such as attractive items that double as school supplies, for instance, can make great stocking stuffers. Clothes, shoes, boots, a new back pack and so on also make excellent gifts, especially if they are at the right price and your child did not get very many new back to school supplies.

As for re-gifting, we are all in favor of it provided it is not fruitcake. But seriously, if you have no use for it, by all means pass it on to someone who will appreciate it, so long as no one will find out or expect you to use or wear the item you were gifted. Also consider if it is genuinely that person’s taste or not. Re-gifting can help fill in blanks in your list, and it can also enable you to give a gift to someone you would like to be able to give one to, but might not have in the budget.

Everyone has different perspectives on Christmas and what they wish to spend versus what they can afford. If your gap has widened this year, be honest about it and focus on all the fun and free ways you can celebrate the holidays. The new found financial freedom you start creating for yourself and your family will be well worth it and the best gift you can give to your children.

For more top tips on how to save money at the holidays, see How to Save Money this Holiday Season

These are just a few of the items you will want to add to your shopping list and try to get at the best prices.

Fruits and Vegetables

*Oranges
*Cranberries
*Tangerines
*Pomegranates
*Pears
*Pumpkins
*Persimmons
*Sweet potatoes
*Broccoli
*Spinach
*Mushrooms
*Winter squash

Grocery Savings

*Turkey
*Cheese
*Butter
*Baking supplies
*Pie crusts and readymade dough
*Frozen pies
*Dinner rolls
*Cake mix and frosting
*Pie fillings
*Nuts (peanuts, pecans and walnuts for baking and so on)
*Spices
*Dried fruits
*Halloween clearance candy (especially if they do not have Halloween wrappers on them. If they do have orange wrappers, use them around Thanksgiving.)
*Soup (low sodium if you can find it)
*Broth (low sodium if you can find it)
*Marshmallows
*Oatmeal

Other Non-Food Items:

*Trees, bulbs and shrubs
*Carpeting
*Flooring
*Electronics
*Tools
*Toys
*Christmas gifts
*Aluminum foil
*Baking pans
*Plastic wrap
*Cookware

FURTHER READING
YOUR RECESSION SURVIVAL GUIDE: How to Save Money and Even Boost Your Income in This Recession

Smart Spending Strategies

Q. How do I save money on candy at Halloween?

A. Candy prices go up during the last couple of weeks of October because everything adopts the Halloween packaging and is sold specifically for this purpose. Beat the price jump by buying your candy a couple of weeks before the big rush. Store your candy in a cool, dry place, so it’s fresh when it’s time to use it. To save big, shop the sales after the holidays and buy anything that is not specially packaged for Halloween. This candy will do just fine for the Christmas holidays and can be up to 90% off the list price. If it is orange and other fall colors, it will probably do just fine for the Thanksgiving holiday.

Halloween has become a huge holiday in the United States. If you want to get into the holiday spirit without spending a fortune, shop smart and try a bit of DIY and enjoy the sense of accomplishment that you and your children will experience in having a do it yourself Halloween.
YOUR RECESSION SURVIVAL GUIDE: How to Save Money and Even Boost Your Income in This Recession

Q. How can I save money on the things I do need to buy for Halloween?

A. Avoid the fancy Halloween party stores and opt for other options instead. You can buy Halloween decorations through Goodwill and similar secondhand stores. Halloween decorations and certain costume elements can easily be purchased inexpensively secondhand and, when you are done using them, you can donate them back to these stores to pass the savings on to someone else. You can also get a receipt for your donation from the Salvation Army and take the deduction on your taxes next April. Check their website for the value they allow for each item you donate and be sure to get a receipt from them for everything you bring.

Another way to save big is to check out 99 cent stores. They often have cheap decorations, paper goods and coloring books and activity books with holiday themes that your kids can use for decorations, placements, costume ideas and patterns, and more.

Check Pier 1 as soon as the season is over and save up to 90% off on any leftovers of their holiday line. Then put them away until next year.

YOUR RECESSION SURVIVAL GUIDE: How to Save Money and Even Boost Your Income in This Recession

Q. How can I save money on Halloween decorations?

A. Let your children participate in the decorating. Buy craft paper in a variety of colors and help each child create their own decorations. Create leaves, pumpkins and other seasonal items in various appropriate colors. (Hint: You can keep these kinds of decorations around the house right the way through to Thanksgiving.)

Also let them make some more scary ones, ghosts, zombies, witches and so on.

Tape them into the windows or mount them on the fridge door our your outer door. You can cover the ones on the outer door with plastic film to protect them from the wind and rain. For example, using just plain white computer paper, your kid could make a huge life-sized skeleton for your door.

Go online to some homeschooling or teachers’ resources sites to download free coloring sheets and more. You don’t have to go the expensive route for excellent Halloween decorations. Let the kids use their imaginations, and keep the pumpkins and leaves for Thanksgiving. Save the more spooky items for next year and they can be keepsakes for years to come.

YOUR RECESSION SURVIVAL GUIDE: How to Save Money and Even Boost Your Income in This Recession

Q. How can I save money on Halloween decorations?

A. Let your children participate in the decorating. Buy craft paper in a variety of colors and help each child create their own decorations. Create leaves, pumpkins and other seasonal items in various appropriate colors. (Hint: You can keep these kinds of decorations around the house right the way through to Thanksgiving.)

Also let them make some more scary ones, ghosts, zombies, witches and so on.

Tape them into the windows or mount them on the fridge door our your outer door. You can cover the ones on the outer door with plastic film to protect them from the wind and rain. For example, using just plain white computer paper, your kid could make a huge life-sized skeleton for your door.

Go online to some homeschooling or teachers’ resources sites to download free coloring sheets and more. You don’t have to go the expensive route for excellent Halloween decorations. Let the kids use their imaginations, and keep the pumpkins and leaves for Thanksgiving. Save the more spooky items for next year and they can be keepsakes for years to come.

Q. How can I make cheap Halloween costumes?

A. Use what you already have in the house as much as you possibly can to avoid having to spend a lot on costumes every Halloween. Let’s face it, the children grow every year, but in most cases your budget doesn’t, so start with anything that your children might have used last year and pass along or freshen up the costumes as ‘hand-me-downs’.

In many cases you can easily add bits or take them away to modify or create a whole new look.. For instance, a pirate costume one year can be a three Musketeers costume the next. A black witch costume one year can be a black cat costume the next. You may still need to buy a few accessories, colored felt, fabric, face paint, headbands and the like, but this will still greatly reduce the costs of your Halloween costumes.

Also consider getting patterns online and using fabric remnants. A vampire, witch’s or magicians cape with appropriate clothing underneath (a white shirt and black pants or a dark colored dress) is simple and fun to make. Then all you need are fangs, a broom stick or a magic wand. You can keep the cloak for years for other costumes or hand-me-downs.

Q. How can I save money on the things I do need to buy for Halloween?

A. Avoid the fancy Halloween party stores and opt for other options instead. You can buy Halloween decorations through Goodwill and similar secondhand stores. Halloween decorations and certain costume elements can easily be purchased inexpensively secondhand and, when you are done using them, you can donate them back to these stores to pass the savings on to someone else. You can also get a receipt for your donation from the Salvation Army and take the deduction on your taxes next April. Check their website for the value they allow for each item you donate and be sure to get a receipt from them for everything you bring.

Another way to save big is to check out 99 cent stores. They often have cheap decorations, paper goods and coloring books and activity books with holiday themes that your kids can use for decorations, placements, costume ideas and patterns, and more.

Check Pier 1 as soon as the season is over and save up to 90% off on any leftovers of their holiday line. Then put them away until next year.

Q. How do I save money on candy at Halloween?

A. Candy prices go up during the last couple of weeks of October because everything adopts the Halloween packaging and is sold specifically for this purpose. Beat the price jump by buying your candy a couple of weeks before the big rush. Store your candy in a cool, dry place, so it’s fresh when it’s time to use it. To save big, shop the sales after the holidays and buy anything that is not specially packaged for Halloween. This candy will do just fine for the Christmas holidays and can be up to 90% off the list price. If it is orange and other fall colors, it will probably do just fine for the Thanksgiving holiday.

Halloween has become a huge holiday in the United States. If you want to get into the holiday spirit without spending a fortune, shop smart and try a bit of DIY and enjoy the sense of accomplishment that you and your children will experience in having a do it yourself Halloween.

FURTHER READING

YOUR RECESSION SURVIVAL GUIDE: How to Save Money and Even Boost Your Income in This Recession