Christmas 2015 "Nest Egg"

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missjane

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Are you saving for Christmas 2015, yet? You still have 7 months from now until November...

I know many of you pick up deals all throughout the year. I can't seem to shop that way. We live 50 miles from our "big" shopping place. Locally, we only have Walmart, Super1 (grocery), and three dollar stores - Family Dollar, Dollar General, and Dollar Tree. It always seems when we do go to Monroe, we have a rather lengthy list of very specific things we need to do that takes all our time, therefore, I don't really have time to shop and browse for Christmas bargains as I would like to. So, I resort each year to saving so I can purchase nearer to Christmas.

Many did the 52 week challenge last year. Are any of you doing it?

I've been putting money in savings once a month and adding money to a Walmart card. (It always seems we end up buying a lot from there for the holidays - not always gifts, either.)

I've also been saving $5 bills. I've had to dip into them twice, so not as much as I would have had, but still have most of them - glad I had them to dip into!

I need to start doing some grocery stores...seems Lana did two or three of those last year.
 

happy2bme

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Every payday $50 goes into the Christmas Club account. By the end of October, the account is fully funded and I set the Christmas budget with the amount that is in the account.

No after Christmas debt here!!!
 

Minta

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We have a Christmas Club account. I am a little behind on my payments into it but I plan on catching that up next month. I also have a few gifts already bought.

I also startd working on a grocery list of things that I will need for the holidays. With the back to school sales at the grocery stores I can get a jump start on some of the ingredients that I need for my holiday baking. It really helps that I can stretch buying a lot of that stuff over a couple months by matching what I need up with the sales.
 
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missjane

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Remember, in the US, we have Memorial Day coming up. After the holiday there may be red decor and paper products on clearance.
 

Lana

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I have a Christmas Club that some much from each of my pays go into. We have another Christmas Club that so much of each of our pay goes into for real estate taxes. Also have a Vacation Club that so much of my pay goes into that comes out middle of May. But this year that will go directly into the real estate fund. I had to stop some payments into it when getting the new car and such and knew I would just put this into it.

Might raise the Vacation Club amount after this check comes out.

I try to save $20 from each pay in an envelope towards Christmas to buy gift cards to use at stores or have the cash and then $5.00 from each pay to buy gift cards at grocery stores or Wal-Mart to use towards food and cookie/candy making. It seems if I don't buy gift cards with the cash every so often then we have to dip into the cash too. One year I had to buy tires from the cash so doesn't always get to go for the holidays.

I have been getting a few presents here and there. Small items but they add up!
 

sweetpumkinpye

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We put $55 per fortnight into a Christmas Club account. We cannot touch this until November 1st as the bank will not allow it.
I buy all throughout the year, I always have at least one layby on at any one time, and every shop I buy stocking items and food items to store away for baking and Christmas lunch. I share the Christmas baking and dinner list with my mum so we have 2 shopping.
At this early stage, if I had no more chance to shop, we would be in pretty good shape.
 

snowlvr

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Reading this thread inspired me to check and see if I could set up a Christmas club account on line through my bank-I could and I did! Put $100 in it, and will start putting money in it regularly now..I buy a little bit through the year, mostly for my sister, since we send each other an assortment of "small" presents, but for immediate family it seems to work best if I do most shopping after Oct..I do keep an eye out for stocking stuffers through the year..
 

sweetpumkinpye

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Snowlvr I do an automatic transfer from my pay every fortnight. I do not even think about it, it is something that I organised a few years back. It is amazing how soon it adds up.
I use it for a few things before Christmas but for the most part I use it for after Christmas when things may be a bit tight.
 

missjane

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Katrina, that's what we use some of our Christmas savings for, too. We get our December paycheck about 1 1/2 to 2 weeks before normal and only get paid once a month, so it's like 6 weeks without a paycheck. Even though we say we aren't going to start using from our checking until regular payday (25th of each month), it never works out that way, so it always comes in handy to have the extra in savings.
 

jollykelly

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I am fortunate that I can shop throughout the year....hallelujah for amazon. I also use the envelope system and I put $20 of each check in the envelope. I try to buy all my gifts without touching it, and then I have a nice cushion after Christmas, though it always doesn't work out that way.
 

sweetpumkinpye

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For kids in Australia the school year starts in early February. I always appreciated having the Christmas money so I could go and buy the school supplies.
Now that the kids are working, I often use that "spare" cash to buy anything that I see in the post Christmas sales to get a jump start on the new year.
Like a lot of you it is just nice to have that buffer and not go into debt over Christmas.
 

sweetpumkinpye

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It is getting to the time of year when we should all seriously start saving. Even if we started now we would have a nice little nest egg come December.
 

snowlvr

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This is the first year I have had a holiday account at my credit union where the money comes right out of my paycheck-it has been great seeing it build every month!
 

p.a.

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I love the gift card idea....I think I'll get a few and load the up a bit each time I'm in the stores.
 

sweetpumkinpye

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I am not sure if we can "top up" gift cards here. You generally purchase them for a given amount and that is it.
 

HouseElf

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We put money each payday into our account, from this account I shop for Christmas throughout the year. We also set up our account so that each time we use our debit card - 1$ goes into this savings account - a little that adds up quickly.