BellaOnline Forums Money Frugal Living What frugal gift ideas do you have to suggest?

I'm in the same position...

What I was going to do was make oil-candles out of recycled jars and dried herbs, pine-cones, Juniper,dried cranberries, etc. It's really easy!

You just need a jar, a drill, some wick and believe it or not...you've got to go to like a home-depot and ask where they keep the ehemmm..."nipples."

K...makin' my husband do that, lol. But you need it to thread the wick.

Other than that, I started making my own Vanilla about 7 months ago for Dec. So, it's a Bourbon/Tahitian in pure form. Was thinking about going to a thrift store and looking for baskets or just this year make something myself

I guess I'm meant to learn how to get to this forum, lol.

I meant for this post, to go here, instead of another area in the same forum.

But about the "Frugal Giving" idea, and "Nipple" asking at a hardware store:

No kidding

(I want to be at the round table when they decided to name it that one)!

There's no way on God's Green Earth I'm going up to a hardware store manager or employee and ask for a couple of nipples...even in bulk can't be done!

Either way, one of us would lose it,lol. Hubby gets to do this one.

Not to worry...I always pay it forward. It's the little things that count, especially long-term.

It really is

Elleise, we must have the recipes for the oil candles and the vanilla. Please share. Do they end up being a frugal expenditure?

I usually find nice things for people at thrift stores for my gift-giving.

Some years I ban all gift-giving around holidays completely.

I pretty much HAVE to do the gift giving this year, since I will be with Dan's family and everyone is trading gifts. So I have various books I picked up, plus a huge stack of interesting and unusual business cards for my MIL, who collects them.

My MIL is super easy to get gifts for. The SIL and niece, no so much. The niece especially has expensive tastes.

I found a cool frugal gift for my SIL. Her kitchen is very Tuscany. At the Restore, I found some rustic ceramic tiles that were made in Italy - they were 25 cents each. So I got two of the for her to use as hot plates. I set them out in the kitchen when she wasn't there, and they looked beautiful. So I will wrap them up as one of her gifts.

A thoughtful 50 cent gift that she will really love! The same thing would probably sell for $10 each at a kitchen store.

I went into a Dollar Tree with Dan and he found a col plastic straw-with-cup thing that his mom likes and always gets from walmart for $6 or $8. Here it was $1, so it will be another Xmas gift for her. It's clear with a nice red grippy stripe in the center.

You know one of the greatest gifts I received was from a neighbor. She was 87 yrs old. I use it to this day, every day actually.

But it was from the dollar store and it is a red-rubber-spatula thingy, with a big rubber swipe on one end and a little one on the other. Brilliant!

Since I can NEVER and I do mean NEVER-EVER remember where I put things. Well this little gadget is BRIGHT-RED, yet small enough to fit in w/my whisks.

But it's one of those things cooks use to either ice a cake w/or scoop out all the mixture from a bowl if you happen to be making a cake. I don't know that "spatula" is the correct term, but what it cost?

$1.00

Karen, what a great thing: the best gift is something actually useable! I'm totally on-board with that.

Idea for saving money on gift wrapping:

I will be wrapping people's gifts with some fabric this week - we already have the fabric, it will look cute, and such gift wrap will cost me nothing and ALSO be reusable.

Jilly, I totally get that!!!

To me, I know I might seem odd (I do things a bit differently, but it's honest) but I can only make or send a gift IF I know the person, needs or uses it. It's like a mental block for some reason.

But this year? I started making Vanilla, oh about a yr ago, for Christmas gifts. They range from Mexican to Tahitian and Bourbon and a little mixture of my own w/a bit of lavender and a few other ingredients - "The House Special."

I LOVE the fabric idea. In fact I have some burlap and the old-fashioned twine which I plan to sprinkle w/the lavender I dried and rose pedals in a see through bag, w/a small-musin bag w/a name tag inside, so people can use the dried flowers as sachets if they choose.

It's actually fun to be creative, plus I'm or always have been an "outside of the box" thinker. It used to get me into a great deal of trouble too