Contest Entries
As we all have experienced, once December rolls around, it seems as if all of our bills are due on Christmas Day! Of course what we do is get a loan through National Payday!! But then whats if that's just not enough. The mortgage, the car payment, the water, the electric, etc... and there's just no money to buy your family, friends, co-workers, and your neighbor a gift. So you start thinking...what am i going to do?!?! Well from my past experiences, you have to, of course, stay on budget. What we do as far as gift giving with friends is get everyone together. We then put all of our names into a hat, whomever's name you get, is your person to buy for. The spending limit is set at $30.00. As far as my co-workers, we all draw names secretly (Secret Santa Exchange), and then we bring in our gifts on the specified day. Our spending limit with that exchange is $20. Then, that takes the worry out of "How am I going to afford gifts for 13 friends and 40 co-workers?!" We have done the exchange of names for a few years now, and I have saved so much money, not having to buy for EVERYONE!! As far as family goes, you want to buy for everyone, of course. But I always set a limit on how much to spend per person. And I always suggest to buy gifts per couple, such as my aunt's and uncle's receive gifts they can both use...so you only have to buy one gift. I am definetly on a budget this year. My son just turned 2 and I just found out I am 5 weeks pregnant! So Christmas this year is definetly going to be tight, but using my "Money Saving Gift-Giving" Ideas will definetly save me some money, and if you use my method as well...I hope it saves you money too!!!
Well, there isn't much gift buying here!! I am married and added a new arrival to the family this year so I now have two beautiful daughters. With the new acquired hospital bills from having to have a C-section and the added expense of another child, it is a rough year for Christmas!! I work a full time job, am a full time mom, and had to get a part time job just to make ends meet. My husband and I both have good jobs but the way the economy is right now we are just making ends meet. One money saving gift that I have this year is that my sister had some gifts left over from last year that she had given to her sunday school kids so I am taking the left over gifts so my daughter can give a gift to her daycare friends and friends at school. Then for some of the other family members, we have gift cards left over from last year that we couldn't use because of how far away the store is from us, so we will be giving them to them. National payday has helped me so I can buy a few gifts for my two daughters this year but an additional $400 would really help us to make it a good christmans for my daughters!!! Otherwise it would be a giftless christmas this year if it wasn't for National payday!!
My boyfriend joined the army at 37 years old and - until just a week ago - I thought I wouldn't get to see him again until well after he had been deployed. Then, the wonder of Christmas appeared when I received word from him that he would be able to travel home for the holiday Exodus. In lieu of having arrangements in place, I quickly became discouraged trying to figure out which utility I could forego to afford to go down and get him and bring him home. Thanks to my loan from national payday, he will be home for the holidays and we'll have heat, a phone, and cable too! Thanks for making this holiday one to remember.
I have a very large family. 6 sisters and 1 brother, 17 neices and nephews, and 14 great nieces and nephews. Every year I try to buy all of them gifts but each year it gets harder and harder. This year I came up with the idea of having a family dinner and having all of them over. We have not had a family dinner with all of us in one place since my mother passed away, the tradition kind of died with her. The holidays are a time for family to get together and be thankful we have one another. The $400.00 would help tremendously with the food I have to purchase to have this family celebration. This would be my gift to my family starting the tradition that we lost when our mother passed, I know she would be happy!
Recently mold was found in the walls of my home so I had to move unexpectedly and quickly. Obviously and expense I hadn't anticipated. So I moved my two sons to a new place Dec. 1st using everything I had in savings. Some of my other family members also had some extra expenses so we chose not to buy Christmas gifts this year and each family member was assigned different tasks. So one will do a collage or scrapbook of 2007 events, another will write a story of their favorite childhood Christmas, another will write a version of the Christmas story (depending on their faith) and perform a small play of it and finally another will perform a small Christmas concert with the kids. Christmas gifts will be bought four immediate family this year so $400 would go a long way in getting something under the tree.
