How are you coping with Christmas finances?

This year our budget is severely limited. My 3 kids are all adults now, so I've set a budget of £30 each and worked out what I'm getting.
The only others we're buying for are 2 nieces and one grandchild who we'll probably spend about £15 each on.

If you have a lot of people to buy for, it makes sense to either start buying earlier in the year to spread the cost, or save some money each month. After all, it comes around at the same time each year!

This is the best year we have done, for years it was a panic where to find the money for gifts but this year we saved up and have been buying bits each week to put away since early in the year. I hope you manage I used to feel awful that we had such a little amount for presents but really found pepole loved the home made small personal gifts more than anything else.

I do the sealed pot challenge on here. It really adds up. I also don't spend too much, my children are young so haven't really got used to getting heaps and heaps anyway.

Hope it all works out for you

Well, the kids are all grown up, so they get cash (£100, but there's 5 of them, so that's more than enough!!). On top of that, the only one we spend money on is the granddaughter. We'll buy token gifts for my parents and OH's brother and sister, and a box of chocs for work, but that's it.

For food, I've just bought £97 pounds worth of Morrisons savings stamps to get the £3 free (that's slightly better than the 3% I get from Santander - and I don't have to wait the full year for it!!). That will cover the booze.

We're catering for 7 on Christmas Day, with an as yet unknown quantity of folk staying over in the days before and after. I might get another savings card at Morrisons. I'll also cash in my Nectar points at Sainsbugs (I have no brand loyalty at all...). I've already started buying odds and ends of food that will keep.

Our guests for Christmas Day have said they will provide the wine etc for the meal itself, so we only need to buy booze for the surrounding days.

To the OP - never ever ever feel pressured into spending more than you feel comfortable with. Give yourself the gift of a debt-free New Year. If people are going to judge you by how much you spend on them, they're not worth spending anything on.

We don't buy gifts for 90+% of the family. I buy something little from DD (4) to 2 of her 3 cousins, and we have a challenge with friends to put together something for less than £4 per child.

Apart from a bit of food and a real tree we don't buy anything else.