The Free Christmas Challenge

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Christmas has always been a financial drain on my husband and me. Both of our parents are split up and with other partners, making our immediate family quite large. In total we planned on giving $600 worth of presents to our immediate family, budgeting $20 per person. It’s a lot of money for us, but we enjoy giving gifts. I even enjoy the challenge of finding the perfect gift for less than $20 – I get a huge sense of accomplishment out of this.

Last year I made a goal to set aside $20 from each of my paychecks for Christmas money. We ended up with around $400 by November, which was a huge chunk of our spending budget but still not enough (the $600 doesn’t include gifts for myself, my husband and our son). Plus, with me being on maternity leave the last 4 months of the year (and a decreased salary) it hurt.

So this year I’m setting a new goal for myself. The Free Christmas 2016 Challenge.

What will I be doing differently this year? Hopefully not spending any money! I regularly earn extra money with surveys, so this year, instead of spending them instantly (usually on myself), I’m planning on stockpiling them, along with credit card reward points to get our whole Christmas paid for.

I’ve set our budget this year at $900 (our son will be 16 months by then, so we’ll actually do gifts, unlike 2015), which means I will have to earn approximately $81 per month for the next 11 months.
It’s a little ambitious, but I’m up for the challenge. After all, how amazing would it be to have Christmas completely paid for?

Here is where I’m starting the year off at:
started out January 1st with:
YouGov: 12,250 Points
SurveySavvy: $107
I-Say: 466 points
Opinion Outpost: 35 points
MyPoints: 1466 points
MySurvey: 47 points
American Consumer Opinion Panel: 2070 points
Swagbucks: 2191 points
Mintvine: 955 points

Check out my full list of survey sites here!

Are you up for the challenge? Let me know in the comments below.