Cheap Ways to Prioritize Family this Holiday Season

The holidays always seem to catch me off guard. Autumn flies by, whether I like it or not, and before I know it, I’m looking at Thanksgiving, parties, shopping, and a whirlwind schedule to close out the year. But at the same time, the holidays provide a fantastic opportunity to connect with our loved ones. Those same parties and dinners are usually with some of our most favorite people. However, sometimes it feels like each extra party I get invited to; it comes with added costs.

In addition, I’m also still working though the jealousy of my 2.5-year-old, who is still adjusting to not being the only child anymore. As much as he loves his 5-month-old sister, and he really truly does, his jealousy still gets the best of him sometimes and he needs some extra mom and dad love. Because of this, I find myself trying to find fun family entertainment we can all enjoy where my attention can be less on our infant, and more on our toddler. In this manner he can feel a little more loved than he might be if we were just playing at home and my attention was directed elsewhere. But that too can be extra hard to do on a budget, especially here in New England, with the cold starting to seep in.

Our favorite weekend adventures tend to include smaller outings – like trips to the library, the local playground or parks, or the school fields to play soccer (my son loves soccer). We are also members of our local YMCA and sometimes we’ll prefer to just go swimming.

Despite how they creep up on me, I always look forward to the holidays because they provide fun new ways to spend time together, centralized around the spirit of the holidays. My husband is between jobs right now, so I’ve been especially eager to explore this coming holiday season as frugally as possible. So with that, I’ve put together following list which have collectively become my holiday bucket list this season:

• Take our own pictures of our children with Santa instead of paying for the mall ones. Last year, our library brought Santa in for a couple hours, in a free “bring your own camera” event. Not only did I get awesome pictures of my son with Santa for free, but my son got to interact and connect with him because there wasn’t a long line and the Santa at the library read him a book. I’m definitely planning on doing it again this year.
• Decorate gingerbread houses. This requires some upfront costs for the goods, but maybe I’ll invite all my family and friends over, have everyone pitch in, have a contest, and start a new awesome tradition.
• Host a cookie swap. This is where the host bakes one kind of cookie and invites a whole bunch of people to do the same. Then everyone grabs a plate and takes a whole bunch of different types of cookies. At the end of the day you’re left with a reasonable number of cookies of all different types and variety. In reality, I won’t host a cookie swap, but my department at work has one every year, so I’ll still participate in one. And let’s face it, who doesn’t love a good Christmas cookie?
• Donate things we no longer need to our church or charity of choice. I’ve been on a decluttering kick as of late, so this seems only natural. This gets stuff out of the house at a time when there is a lot of new stuff coming in, starts to instill traits of giving and generosity in my son at a young age, and is free.
• Donate time. I’ll admit my son is a little too young for him to recognize and realize the significance if we did this, but I have a couple ideas between the library, church, and some local soup kitchens for us to get involved in in a couple years’ time.
• Drink hot cocoa and drive around to see the Christmas lights. Not going to lie, our family will probably do these two things separately (I do not trust my toddler in the car with hot cocoa). But either one of these, alone or together, are two classic ways to spend quality time with loved ones on a budget.
• Start a new tradition. I feel like at 2, almost 3, we are at a prime age to start some new traditions. Be it making wreaths, writing letters to Santa, caroling, baking Christmas cookies (for ourselves and/or Santa), or any other fun holiday idea, we’ll definitely be adding a new tradition to our holiday repertoire this year.
• Go to a tree lighting. I think every town does their own separate tree lighting, at least around here. Our town has food, music, raffles, a festival of the trees contest, lights of course, and Santa too (he shows up on a fire truck which is pretty cool for my son)! We always really enjoy ourselves and its 100% free to attend. Though some of the entertainment (food, raffles, etc.) costs extra, we’ve never felt the need to spend anything.
• Sing/play holiday tunes. This year my focus will be on teaching my son the classics (and probably will be for a couple more years). Growing up, however, my sisters and I each played and instrument, and one of our big family traditions was to pull them out to play the carols to our family and friends on Christmas Eve
• Make a gift together. We like to have our son give a gift to his grandparents and godparents for Christmas, but that can add up and become costly. By taking a Saturday afternoon to make gifts instead, we’ve not only decreased costs, but it becomes much more meaningful to Memere and Pepere (our version of Grandma and Grandpa) too.

Having dedicated things to do and places to go as a family that are toddler friendly have really helped my son transition to our new family of four status. Changing it up as the holidays approach gives us the opportunity to help him learn about this special season while keeping it interesting. And given the high costs already associated with the holidays between travel and gifts, spending time with family doesn’t have to be expensive. These were just a few ideas for my own family I wanted to share, and hopefully they inspire you and your family to get out and do something fun this season, even if you’re on a budget.