Shop Ahead and Save (Imperfect Homemaking Challenge)

One easy way to cut a lot of expense is to shop ahead for gifts.  I'm on the lookout all year for clearance items for those that I know will need Christmas and birthday gifts.  I also pick up other nice toys when I find them marked way down so that when we get a birthday invitation from some procrastinating person who invites us the day before I don't have to spend gas, time, and stress running to the store to to buy a full-priced present.

The imperfect homemaking way to handle all that is just to do it — see something cheap, buy it, stick it in the gift tub, and forget about it until you need to shop from your tub.

The not-so-imperfect homemaker way to do it is to actually write down what you got for who so that you don't buy the same person two gifts and end up actually spending more.

You can print the one pictured right here.

We imperfect homemakers don't always do the greatest job of planning ahead.  But it doesn't have to be hard.  You don't even have to keep track on the printable.  Next time you see something on clearance for an amazing price, think “To whom could I give that?”  If you can't think of anyone, don't buy it just because it's cheap.  If you can think of someone, buy it and stick it in your gift tub and you just saved yourself some money and a trip to the store when the next birthday rolls around.

It's easy!

Today's challenge: Get in the habit of taking a quick peek through the clearance racks every time you walk past them at the store.

Don't buy things just because they're cheap, buy them when you know who the recipient will be.

If you’re just joining the 31 Days of Imperfect Homemaking series, you can see all the posts here.