For the love of frugal Christmas

I was tickled pink by all the encouraging feedback about my frugal garland decorating that I thought I would show a few more little frugal finds I got this week. These cutie patootie felt trees are from the Dollar Tree...can you believe it? $1! My girl Amanda at Imperfectly Beautiful was sharing hers and I just had to get a few of my own. Check out her recent giveaway here to win some for yourself! I love the colors and I love the polka dots...A sweet little hot cocoa cart serves some mugs, candy cane cocoa, and candy cane stirrers along with my new favorite tree...

A festive ornament cookie jar from Wal-Mart adds an adorable touch to the kitchen...and notice my candle has an added ribbon for a more holiday feel.

This stocking was also from the Dollar Tree (can you believe it?) and is perfect next to the stove to store food filled spoons when cooking. My other favorite find of the week are these salt and pepper penguins. Oh my goodness gracious, I was goooing at these babies in Target like a little kid in the toy aisle...I love them so much I think I will have to marry them...sorry Brent! ;)

Also at the Dollar Tree were mini silver trees...holy cow...I bought three! They are perfect for adding a little holiday touch and shimmer here and there. The one pictured is in the bathroom, one is in the kitchen, and the last is in the living room. Sooooo shiny and purtttyy!

This petite red tree was a gift and the vintage plate was found at the Goodwill. The plate feels so warm and country...all I need now is some of that peppermint cocoa...

These Santa spoons were also found at the Goodwill and I put them with the cocoa...A perfect little spoon for some chocolaty goodness!I also thought since I was on a frugal hype, I would share some gift wrapping tips. Instead of buying new Christmas wrapping paper, I used red and green year around paper and added some festive touches. It is nice having basic wrapping paper to use year around that you can add little trinkets to for specific holidays...saves some money and then you don't have to store extra holiday paper for the whole next year. On these gifts I made some simple stamped tags and added silk flowers along with a shimmery bow...the shimmery ribbon makes it feel more like Christmas. Another little thing I do is save tissue paper...the one pictured...Victoria's Secret tissue paper! They hand that stuff out like no body's business for one single pair of panties...my goodness. Well, I put that stuff to some recycled use and they actually match my wrapping paper!For the gift tags I just stamped a piece of card stock and wrote the "to's" and "from's" for a cheap and fun tag.When I am making something small like gift tags, I cringe at the thought of cutting up a brand new piece of paper. I save all of my scraps from scrapbooking and other paper crafts and use every little bit of it. I also scrapbook 8.5x11 so when I buy the square scrapbook paper, I cut it down and save the remains. These are great for adding already pre-cut borders and what not to scrapbooking and also great for quick little projects like the gift tags. As the frugal girl that I am, I found some fun little gifts at Ross. Now I love Ross with a passion...if there was only one store I could shop in for the rest of my life, Ross would be the one. But Ross...could you please put your extra sticky price stickers in a more discrete place??? Because this is U-G-L-Y. I realize that I could get out some rubbing alcohol or chip all my nails off trying to scrape the sticky stuff off...but really, I refuse. For this particular problem I thought I would try to cover it up with...PRETTY LABELS! I love to organize...so these little labels are on everything. I love that they make everything ten times prettier than what the label maker could ever do.I added the labels over those pesky price stickers and wrote little phrases...my nails are thanking me.And yes, even my pepcid deserves to be pretty. ;)Another little thing I added to my gifts were star confetti I punched out. They were a quick and easy task that brought my gift wrap up a fashionista notch.

And totally unrelated to the holidays, I found these adorable mugs at the Dollar Tree as well. They were too cute not to show... so modern for the Dollar Tree...this black and white decor girl was quite impressed!

Loving all the amazing Christmas ideas...keep them coming ladies...and make the most of the budget you got...

"A penny saved is a dollar earned." -B. Franklin