Yes, Santa is real! His elves are at The Dollar Stretcher and they are already hard at work on preparations to make next Christmas warm, memorable and affordable.

For all of you who work hard all year long to make Christmas a special time in the lives of your loved ones, The Dollar Stretcher community now offers you The Christmas Club. This isn't like the kind of club the banks offer to help you tuck away funds. This club is for us to share frugal gift ideas, cheap decorating tips, affordable menus, sales and projects.

Let's keep the holiday bells ringing and work on a very Merry Christmas together!

 I am putting on my elf hat and offering the first tip:

This one comes to us from All You magazine. They suggest using fabric softener sheets to keep the dust off ornaments. First dust each with a sheet, flip it over and wrap the ornament with the sheet to keep dust off in storage.

 I have a stocking stuffer already! Got a free lip balm and put it away just for that.

I got a set of Christmas stamps on clearance for 25¢ that I'm going to use on brown or white lunch bags to make festive Christmas sacks.  Stamp 'em up, fold the top over and punch holes with hole puncher, run a length of curly ribbon through, tie and curl.

re-tired

I have cleared out an old hope chest to (hopefully :) fill with hand made gifts as the year progresses...already have two pairs of hand made mittens in there.

i got an oriental trading company catalog the other day...100 rubber duckies for $39.95........told frank i wanted to order them, and then for at least 5 years we have gifts for kids friends and stocking stuffers ...then i told him i wanted to send his parents rubber duckies and my parents rubber duckies.......he told me that 100 rubber duckies (for 5 years worth of gifts for say 15 people a year?) was a bit excessive.........think ill order them anyways in a few months...........

I, too, have vowed to start my Christmas shopping earlier as I was still out in the malls on Christmas Eve ( only to pick up a couple of small things. ) I would like to get a jump on the stocking stuffers because it can get pretty expensive. I have 3 kids and have stashed away 3 plastic bags with their name on it. When I find something on sale or at a garage sale that would be appropriate I will tuck it away in their bag. That way I can see who has what and what else I will have to buy. I always make sure they have the same amount of presents in their stocking. I found a box of 12 pencil crayons with a sharpener for 25 cents on a clearance rack at a business supplies store... so I am on my way.

I hope to sort my gift stash this week-  dd has a birthday Thursday, I have all her presents left from Christmas, with one from the grocery store, a beautiful beanie horse.  Would like to try to get party favors out of the leftovers---- 

I was at JoAnn Fabrics the other day and bought a winter themed scrap book set for $7.97 for my step daughter. There is no date attached, so I think it will be a great present for next Christmas. I have also vowed to keep at this all year long so that it doesn't hit us so hard in December. I am also making gifts this year, so just need to keep getting the deals.