12 Frugal Days of Christmas
The following is the final post in a three part series written by Rachel who blogs at Keep it Simple. We are excited to have Rachel joining our team of contributing bloggers in 2009.
12 Frugal Days of Christmas!
On the ninth Frugal Day of Christmas, deck your halls on the cheap! Use what you have! If you find that you just don’t have a lot of Christmas décor, repurpose your non-holiday decor. Group candles together and bring in some evergreen branches and pine cones from outside. Use clear vases to display evergreens, cranberries, or Christmas balls off your tree. Make some snowflakes! Paper chains! Popcorn chains!
On the tenth Frugal Day of Christmas, it’s time to entertain! Entertaining on a budget is possible; you just need to keep it simple. Don’t worry about decorations, you’re house is already decorated for Christmas!
For the menu, take inventory of what you already have. Use all recipes.com again if you need. Make the meal potluck if you can.
Use e-cards for invites. No postage, no purchase! There are a lot of free e-vites, so please don’t pay for them!
On the eleventh Frugal Day of Christmas, find a way to give. I know on a tight budget this is challenging. The Christmas season is a season of giving. I would challenge you to find some way you can give of yourself to help someone in need. My parents didn’t have much, but they always found a way to invite a single mom over for dinner.
Volunteer at a soup kitchen! Take your kids to a retirement home to sing Christmas Carols to the elderly! Give to Voice of the Martyrs! Volunteer at your kid’s Christmas party at school. You can give in so many ways.
With that, we come to the twelfth and final day of our Frugal Christmas. Here we remember the reason for the season, Jesus Christ and his coming to this earth. Please remember that He often gets lost in the chaos of the holiday. Do not let the enemy steal your joy for Jesus this Christmas!
And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. 9And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with fear. 10And the angel said to them, “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. 11For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. 12And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.” 13And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying,
14″Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!”
Luke 2:8-14 ESV
Merry Christmas!
If you missed the first two parts of the series click on the links to read Days 1-4 and Days 5-8.
If you are interested in guest blogging for Happy to be at Home’s Frugal and Fabulous Christmas email the 3 moms at 3moms@happytobeathome.net.
For more Frugal Fridays visit Biblical Womanhood.
AUTHOR | Toni
Toni, one of the original 3 Moms, is a military wife and stay-at-home(schooling) mom of six, soon to be seven great kids. On her personal blog, The Happy Housewife, she writes about saving money, healthy eating, recycling, homeschooling, life as a mom, and crafting.
I have thorougly enjoyed the 12 frugal days of CHRISTmas and will incorporate several of these ideas into ours.
Love all your tips. I think frugality…especially at this time of year…really keeps our hearts on the true reason for the season!
I saw a great idea on Martha Stewart’s show that goes with Day 9. Instead of filling up an entire jar with M&Ms, or cranberries, or whatever…she put some big cans down inside as ‘fillers.’ The decorations cover the cans and the jar looks full, but you only end up using half as much!