Tips like these helped us pay off $127K in debt. You can read our story in Slaying the Debt Dragon: How One Family Conquered Their Money Monster and Found an Inspired Happily Ever After.
I know what you’re thinking. It feels just like yesterday that you were shooting fireworks up in the air and celebrating the red, white, and blue. But today, I’m going to encourage thinking about the red and green of Christmas instead. After all, while it seems like a long way off, it is only 24 weeks away. To make sure that you Keep the Happy in Your Holidays, there are plenty of things you should be doing right now. Checking off this little to do list will help you to keep from blowing up your budget to celebrate a very good holiday.
Research
Rather than waiting until late November to begin crafting your financial plan for Christmas, you should begin doing some of the easy legwork today. Read books or follow Pinterest boards with thrifty Christmas tips. I’d recommend my eBook Keep the Happy in Your Holidays: 21 Ways to Save Time, Money, and Your Sanity This Christmas if you haven’t read it already. And I’d suggest following this Pinterest board. You won’t have time to do either in November but you can maximize vacation time and the extra daylight to beef up on your frugal strategies right now.
Begin to Budget
Months away from the emotional pull of the holiday season, now is the perfect time to begin to determine exactly how much (or little) you will spend this year. Think through all of your categories of giving, special holiday décor, seasonal traditions like movies or family photos, and more. At least take a few minutes this week to fill out a rough draft of your budget using these FREE printable Christmas Budget forms.
Make Extra Money
In mid December, you’re probably going to realize you didn’t budget enough for everything. Did you remember to buy a gift for your child’s teacher? What about the dessert for the holiday gathering? So now, is the perfect time to pick up extra work and make a little more money to set aside. Or take advantage of the warmer summer temperatures to have a yard sale and bring in a few extra bucks. Whether you consign clothes, sell broken jewelry at one of those cash for gold places, pick up seasonal work, or unload your treadmill on Facebook, explore ways to raise a bit of extra money to put aside for Christmas now.
Open a Bank Account
Some banks offer special Christmas savings accounts where you can deposit money regularly and then only withdraw it closer to Christmas. This may or may not be the best plan for you but you could open a separate savings account expressly for your Christmas budget. Choose to automatically contribute even a small percentage of your weekly salary from now through the end of the year. 1-5% might not even be missed and you’ll have a nice little savings to use strategically when December rolls around.
Have a Difficult Conversation
Maybe this is a year where you really need to scale back your Christmas gift giving. Now is the time to have difficult conversations with friends and family about where you are at financially. If you wait until even Thanksgiving to share a desire to spend less or even eliminate a present exchange, it may be too late. During the summer months, emotions will run less high, many people haven’t already made purchases, and you can have a more rational conversation. So send an e-mail, have a coffee date, or invite someone over for dinner and open the discussion of reducing how much you spend to celebrate Christmas now.
I know it sounds overboard to begin tackling your holiday budget right now, but come December 24th you’ll be blowing me kisses over the internet if you’ve heeded these words of advice. Your merriest financial Christmas begins today. You won’t regret steps of careful planning.
My book is now available: Slaying the Debt Dragon: How One Family Conquered Their Money Monster and Found an Inspired Happily Ever After. You can also check out Inspiration to Pay Off Debt: 30 Days of Encouragement from the Queen of Free
This post contains an affiliate link. That means when you get a great deal or maybe even something for free, you also help our family pay off our mortgage early. And for that, we royally thank you!
Where I live (Australia), July is when all the stores have their really good toy sales. There are more toy sales just before Christmas; but they’re still not as good as the July sales. I try to buy the big-ticket items this month; I just save the receipts so that way if the kids change what they’re into, I can take them back, no harm done. I’ve never actually had to do that though. At 9 and 6, my kids’ typical letter to Santa is, “Dear Santa, I’ve been good, just surprise me.”
Great plan! 🙂