Have you ever waited until after Christmas to shop for gifts? Most stores put their Christmas items (gift boxes, decorations . . .) on sale starting the day after Christmas. Usually, they are 50% off. After about a week, a lot of stores will mark them down to 75% off. If you don't mind looking through items that are well picked over, now is the time to find some awesome bargains.
In order for this to be profitable, tho, you will need an area in your home to store the gifts you purchase now to save them for Christmas. You will also need some way of reminding yourself what you have purchased and who the gift is for. One idea is to purchase an inexpensive recipe or card holder and write the gift name and recipients name on a card and file it in the box. Just remember to keep the card file where you can find it and remember to check it once in a while.
Throughout the year, you can check sales and purchase items all year long to eliminate the money crunch that is usually associated with Christmas. Remember to write the item and recipients name on a card and put it in your little card file.
Many times, I have purchased my lights or decorations after Christmas for the following year. However, I am not one to wait, so will put them out in the current year to enjoy for a while before putting away all or most of the decorations. In our house, the lights stay up year round as they are too difficult to take down and put back up each year. One of our walls is sixteen feet high and I have
a string of large light bulbs going across it and arching up toward the center (approx 15' high) so I really don't want to have to take those down. They've been up for several years now.
Wrapping paper is one of the best things to buy after Christmas. It keeps well if you don't crunch it and I feel most of it is way too expensive anyway, but I don't mind buying it at 75% off. This year I did buy some paper at regular prices as I decided to wrap all the presents in red, white and blue to match the decorations. I'm including a picture for your enjoyment.
The only problem with taking so much time to wrap the presents just so, is right after I finished and got dinner started, we opened the presents. Usually, they are wrapped at least a day or two ahead so we can enjoy the colors . . . but this year was different. We were in a hurry to get to the ski slopes to do some downhill skiing on manmade snow.
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