Continuing on with searching for “Christmas” in search engines (see Searching Christmas post), here are the results for Bing.

2. Christmas.com

50. Merry Christmas – Games

100. Christmas History

If you do your own search, please feel free to share them with us. Depending on where you live, you may come up with different results.

Please NOTE: Before checking out these sites I recommend that you have your pop-up blocker turned on and your virus scanner up-to-date, just in case. I don’t endorse these sites, these are just what I found using search engines.

It’s time to take a lesson from our childhood and use that amazing savings tool -
a PIGGY BANK.

Put all your loose change throughout the year in your piggy bank (jar, tin, any container will work) then just before it’s time to Christmas shop, roll it up, take it to the bank, and shop. (This works especially well in countries where they have $1 and $2 coins.)

Quick & easy savings. Happy Saving!

Use GIFT CARDS as a savings account, it’s quick and convenient – only downside there is no interest.

When you’re at a store, grab a gift card, reloadable ones are great because you can add to them whenever. Perhaps you just put $10 on it, then the next time you go you add another $10. If you can’t get a reloadable one perhaps a $10 or $25 card every time. (You’ll have a stack of cards, but at least you won’t have to worry).

Department store cards are good because you get a variety items there (ie gifts, party supplies, decorations). Grocery store cards are good too since you always need to buy food for the holidays.

Keep the gift card(s) in a safe place (and remember where ) until it’s time for Christmas shopping. Then you don’t have to worry if you have money for shopping because you saved over the year.

Happy Saving!

With just a little over 4 months to go before the Big Day, we need to have some sort of financial plan in place. Unless, of course, you don’t have to worry about money.

Money is generally tight come December (with all the parties, extra food, visitors, visiting, and gifts), but it doesn’t have to be. I’m usually not very good at budgeting and planning, but over the last few years, I’ve noticed that when I had a budget in place I had peace of mind. Now I didn’t always follow the budget (almost always overspent), but at least I knew that I had a plan and that if things started to fall apart I had a back up.

So, I guess my first Holiday Savings tip is to . . .

BUDGET!

If you’ve never made a Christmas budget before this is what I do:

• Take a piece of paper and divide it into 3 columns (a bigger one and 2 smaller ones).
• Label the big column Expenses, the next column Price, and the third column Actual.
• Next, make a list of everything you need to buy for the holidays – gifts, baking, parties (from napkins and decorations), Christmas cards and stamps, gas for all those long-distance relatives you have to visit, everything you spend for Christmas. Put these under the Expenses column (one line per item).
• Record how much it will cost in the Price column. If you don’t know the cost, just estimate it for now.
• Add up the Price column and that is your working budget for the holidays.
• As you shop and spend money, record the actual cost in the Actual column.

Congratulations you now have your first Christmas budget! I keep my budget in my Christmas Notebook at the back of my lists section (my general to do and cleaning lists are at the front), so it’s easy for me to flip to. Once you’ve done this a couple of times, you’ll basically know what you need, financially, every year and can start saving earlier in the year.

Sorry I’m a little late with this week’s countdown. I was away shopping at Bronner’s CHRISTmas Wonderland (will post more about this later). So here is it we are now just under:

19 weeks
till Christmas!