I truly love Christmas. I love how homes transform beautifully in Christmas themes. I also love the view in the streets, the sounds, and all the other activities that come along with it. But I admit, it’s also the time of the year that I have the tendency to overspend! Hence I need to set a BUDGET. So tonight, I’ll finally be discussing our Christmas Budget with my husband (I hope It’s not that late, we usually do this 2 months ahead). We already need to agree on how much (or little) we can spend because as of today, there are only 44 days until Christmas!
This post is going to be pretty much my outline when I present our budget needs to my husband. I shall be itemizing our spending categories first, and we will be setting the spending goals together later.
image: www.fanpop.com
1. Food
Christmas is really the time of the year with heavier-than-usual spending especially when it comes to food. My husband and I need to set how much to spend for our Christmas Eve dinner and for our family eating-out dates (which is going to be more often this season since we want our kid to enjoy the Christmas sight in malls and other places!).
2. Gifts
We will give gifts to our kidS (yes including our baby on the way!), parents, siblings, grandparents, nieces, nephews, godchildren, other relatives and neighbors. We love them dearly and we should give them a little something (like cards or homemade cookies) to let them know they are remembered! (Moms, I’m coming up with a creative gift ideas post on the blog very soon!)
3. Festivities
I forgot to allot a budget for this last year and it came out hard in the pocket. There were influx in invitations to dinner dates with friends, get-togethers with relatives and some gift swaps!
4. Travel Expenses
My husband mentioned that he wants us to go to a beach during the holidays. This depends on my health though. Wishful that I’ll be fully recovered by then so we could travel! We might be visiting our relatives in Isabela, too!
5. Charity
Christmas is the time to give. We shall not forget to spare a budget for this.
You might have noticed that I didn’t set a budget for decorations this year as we are using the old ones. By the way, do you discuss you Christmas budget with your husband, too, or you just wing it? My husband and I usually sit together to talk about how much we could spend for Christmas. We’ve started doing this since the 2nd year of our marriage. How about you? How do you budget your Christmas? I’d love to hear your great ideas!
Christmas Holiday Planner
Well of course, I cannot end this post without sharing the Christmas Budget Planner I’ve created as the holidays could also be the most financially stressful time of the year, hence a little planning is needed. It’s in PDF format, just follow the link to view and print.
Happy Christmas planning! =)
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