4 Ways to Treat Your Kids on a budget
There’s no question about it is there? We all love our kids to bits, and, if you celebrate it, Christmas can be expensive. A display of affection ploughed into shops to treat our kids. Not just by parents, grandparents, aunties, uncles, and other family members who love buying into the material element of Christmas time. Adults love buying gifts and kids love opening the presents don’t they!
It’s not only this time of year, either. Their birthdays are days where you want to make them feel as special as they are to you. Easter Egg hunts come in the Spring. Halloween in the Autumn.
There’s no shortage of times where we need to get gifts for kids. There are also ways in which you can show your kids just how loved they really are. This is without having to spend a fortune showing them. We all know that having worked hard all year, January can be a financially tight month.
Here are some ways you can treat your kids without having to splurge the cash.
Go on a budget-friendly day out.
With amazing deals all over the UK, there’s no shortage of ways to plan an adventure with your children. If you live close to London then lucky you! Most of the museums and galleries have free entry. Pack up some sandwiches, get on the train and explore all of the museums and galleries that London has to offer.
Your kids will love making memories with you, and you will all enjoy looking at pictures from the day in the years ahead.
Open a Restaurant
A great idea for older kids, and younger kids who love to get crafty. This can be an excellent day activity that will benefit parents too. Particularly if kids are encouraged to cook and then clean up afterwards! Making something they are proud of and tastes good is a great way to get their friends involved with the cooking and of course then the eating.
Encourage the children to plan a menu then write a shopping list, and put together the food they want to serve you. Have them set up a dining area with menus written out. Cheap, because you get the restaurant experience without the price tag. Older kids are taught skills they can use in adult life such as cooking, time management, and budgeting. Not to mention you get to be entertained, too!
Plan a ‘Bake-off’ event
Along similar lines of the above. Show your child how to bake something simple, scones, for example then load them up with a recipe and a method and supervise them with recreating the recipe.
Taste their bakes versus yours, a bit like Bake Off and vote on which is best based on taste, texture and presentation. Remember, the kids of Junior Bake-off had to start somewhere!
Use a token system
An inexpensive gift that all kids treasure is the gift of your time and I can see why. You don’t have to spend money to make them smile. Why not as a Christmas or birthday present, write some tokens for use throughout the year. Choose things you know they’ll love and will encourage good times with your child.
What are some other ways you can treat your children? Check out this guide to giving kids presents that matter and comment on this post any ideas you have. Could you buy them some clothes perhaps? Or take them away for a weekend or have a family holiday as a joint gift?