how to survive holiday shopping

Learn Abby's trick for getting the right present, and staying on budget.

We made this list to help guide you through this holiday season. The holidays can be fun and extremely stressful, this guide was designed to take some of that stress off.

Your main tool this season is a MASTER LIST
It is a list/spreadsheet containing the following:

• All the people you want to give presents to
• Present ideas
• What present was actually purchased 
• Budget if necessary, with a maximum dollar amount to spend on each person
• If you purchase items online, one column could have the dates when those items will be shipped to your home

We prefer to use Google Docs or Google Sheets. That way you don't have a paper that you can loose, and it can be accessed with multiple devices and locations. 

Here is a small and simple sample of a MASTER LIST.

This list has truly be our savior for many years and has saved us tons of time wondering, did we get them anything yet? Then realizing you didn't buy them a gift yet and then having to scramble at the last minute.
It honestly is a great tool to use year to year. If you have many people to gift (teachers, staff, etc.) and forget what you gave someone last year, this is great to refer to without loosing your mind.

This list is meant to be a starter. Customize it however you need to. If you have questions or suggestions for others please comment below.

And if you use this guide, tell us how it went. 
Happy Shopping.

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