Saving Money on Holiday Baking with a Cookie Exchange

Lynnae at Being Frugal.net has partnered with Walmart and Nickelodeon to sponsor a holiday-money-saving tips contest. Here is my entry:

One way to save a lot of money and have some great fun at the same time is to partner together with friends or family and have a cookie/candy exchange. Here's how I'm doing this idea for this year.

Myself and 11 of my closest friends are getting together Sunday evening for our cookie exchange. This is in lieu of exchanging gifts like we have done in the past. Usually we spend around $25 for our gifts, so this will be much cheaper and I think more fun in the end.

We are each choosing our favorite cookie or candy recipe and making 12 dozen of our specialty. That's 144 cookies or candy to exchange! It becomes a frugal idea when you consider that you are only making one kind of cookie, therefore you have limited ingredients instead of making lots of different cookies or candy calling for lots of different, and sometimes expensive, ingredients.

At the party we will divide the cookies and candy among all participants. Each person plans to go ahead and package most of the goodies into treat bags or baskets to give away as gifts. Instant, homemade goodie bags!

My plan for the goodies: Keep 2 dozen for my familyto enjoy. Package up 3 dozen to give to my closest neighbors. Package a dozen each for my sisters who do not bake but love homemade goodies. Take 2 dozen to our family Christmas Eve Party. And the remaining 3 dozen will be given to each set of our grandparents along with some homemade art from my kids.

I bought all of my ingredients for my lemon sugar cookies at Walmart this weekend and the total cost was only $12.36. With this $12.36, I am providing 7 gifts for different families on my list, I get to spend an evening with friends, and I get to taste the best of this year's holiday cookies and candies without slaving away all day and weekend in the kitchen.