There are some great threads about the upcoming holiday season.  How much is your budget?  Do you have one?  Do you limit the number of gifts you will give your child/ren or spouse?  What about extended family and friends?  Tell me about your plans for December 2008 and how you plan to pay for it, your budget, etc.  If you've started, how far along are you already?

If this year goes like the last:

We spent 175.00 on our son

We spent   50.00 total on my parents

My husband doesnt' exchange with any other of his relatives other than his son, my stepson.

My sisters' families and mine no longer draw names, so that is out.

My husband and I don't exchange gifts.

My pets and children I don't even know (charitable) get about 75.00 in total

$300.00 total. This may be lower this year due to EVERYTHING being more expensive.

Since my DH lost a large portion of his income this past Monday, things will be tight.

I'm not really complaining, for the most of us, New Years Day is our favorite holiday!!!

sunshinetreva:

How much is your budget?

 

I normally budget ~ $100 total for four people... mom, dad, sis and bil. This year I will probably be going over by some since I am not sure how much I am going to spend on my trip (where I am getting the gifts)... but will try to keep within that budget. (Even with no income, my dad will donate me the $100 so I can spread some gifts around... and it doesn't go on my "tab" of what I owe him... another topic.)

 

I don't know this year, since I'm coming out of retirement and will start a job on Monday that will almost double our income. Maybe a couple hundred, we already have all the "stuff" we want or need. A new computer would be nice, that's on the list, but I'll have to see how things work out with the job. I definitely have my KMA hat in place if the people aren't good to work with and my tolerance for workplace politics and associated nonsense is very low. (KMA=kiss my a--.)

A motorcycle would be fun but is hardly a necessity, as is a mountain bike, I've been watching craigslist for one of those. We are fortunately in a position where neither one of us ever has to work again if we don't want to, neither of us has an expensive lifestyle. Even when we were both working and were well over six figures we usually only spent a few hundred on holidays.

This is a hard one for me. We do not give gifts to many people, just close family and each other (dh and I!) We spend about $50-75 on each family member (or we like it to look like we spent that much- seperate topic!!!)  When it comes to each other there is no telling. The years we don't set a limit we usually buy less junk. When we only spent x dollars, we both bought each other a bunch of junk to try to make it seem like a lot of great presents. They weren't! So, now we buy each other one or two really nice items. Sometimes that item might cost over $150, or it might be $50. It just depends on what we want.

We realized about a year ago that when we let ourselves buy nicer things we want a lot less. Before, when I was buying the cheapest clothes I could find I had a lot of clothes. Now I an super picky about what I buy, have a lot less but love every item and wear them all of the time.

We've set a budget of $2500 for this holiday season. This will include gifts for the 4 of us, 4 grandparents, my nephews, my SIL, our 2 neighbors, 4 teachers, 2 families (we do a family gift for our closest friends), 2 gifts for the Giving Tree at the kids school (I let the kids pick one "ornament"), 2 charity gifts, holiday baking, Christmas dinner, our trip to the tree farm for the tree & pointsettias, Christmas cards, photos of the kids for the cards, postage, and traveling. This is about 1/3 of what we've spent in the past!!

ugh  lots of money because birthday/xmas and other holidays/anniversary  season starts in sept with us.  starting in sept with ds birthday and ending in feb with our anniversary. birthdays..both kids, sil, dh, homestay student, mom,fil,mil, about 5 friends kids birthday, both our and inlaws wedding anniversaries. Their 50th this year so have to do something special for that.  xmas, thanksgiving, halloween, valentine's day and new years. spend spend spend.

for xmas, close family, our neighbour, a couple of friends, our student. have some small things put away for teachers, neighbours etc.  plus a few things for ds xmas and birthday.   I do the chrisco xmas hamper so that helps with food since I pay for it all year. 

so most months will be $200 and up. $2000 maybe? in total.  I try to buy  with sales etc.  I will have to track it close this year and see.

17 individuals and 5 couples - $900 either in gift cards or cash. We save up all year and have already met 2008 goal. We are now starting 2009. Not as easy as it sounds. We roll a lot of coins and stick to a strict spending budget. I've put friends on notice that "going overboard and trying to outdo last year" is unacceptable and suggested donations to charity.

We don't exchange gifts because we already have too much stuff as it is...we will buy little things for the kids like books or small toys.  My holiday budget is about $150...that's for gifts to teachers, bus drivers, the people who run the after school program, and the pet sitter.   I usually just put some money aside each month to fund this.

My budget consists of what ever I have left from paying the bills and if I can talk dh out of the STAR rebate check this year (unless gov patterson decides to stop giving them out) something around $300 for dh, 5 dks, teachers (till they get a paper route then they have to buy for their teachers) 2 parents, the school social worker (a good friend) a cousin and anyone else I care to give to.

The last couple years the teachers, sw, mail/trash men, pastor, 2 church secetaries, cousin, & ds's paper route boss (also a good friend) and parents have gotten 4 mini loaves of fruit bread, a mini jar of jam and something from the dollar store that I know they could use/would like. So far no one's complained (of course they know if they do I'll skip them in the future) and if I can get this cheese making thing down I might toss in a lbs in the future.

So far this year I've found 6 old dvd's (pre 1960's) for mom 2/$1 @ the thrift store including one that has a Christmas Carol on it (she's been complianing that she can't find that on tv Christmas eve) and and some foot warmers for the trash & mail men that were 3/$1 @ Big Lots on a close out but am keeping my eyes open for everyone else.