Quick and Cheap Holiday Gifts

With the holidays coming in quickly, it's time to buckle down and get our gifts together to give to those we love. That said, it's also the time of year to be short on cash and for those without an income, gift giving becomes even more difficult.

Thankfully for us living in this society, there's Pinterest. Bless Pinterest users for posting gift ideas that cost nothing or hardly anything at all. I have to say, up until a few months ago, I didn't really use it, but I think it's got some of the best ideas for gift giving especially!

1. Sugar Scrub
I feel like sugar scrubs and bath bombs are really popular this year. With the store Lush expanding all over the US, these items are becoming everyone who likes a good bath's favorites.

T sugar scrub is seriously the easiest product to make ever.

INGREDIENTS:

• 1/2 cup oatmeal
• 1/4 cup baby oil
• 1 1/4 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup honey

I've found that you can replace the oil with a bit of extra honey. Simply throw all of that into a bowl, mix and bam, sugar scrub complete.

2. Bath Bomb

These are one of my favorites to make and they can cost a little bit of money, but that little bit can go a long way. Not only that, but you can customize these to look any way you want.

INGREDIENTS (makes 2.5 8oz bath bombs):

• 8 oz of baking soda
• 4 oz of citric acis
• 4 oz of corn starch
• 4 oz of finely grained Epsom salts
• 3/4 teaspoons of water
• 2 teaspoons of essential oil
• Round, plastic, snap together dome molds

These ingredients may look a bit intimidating, but they're really simple to make. Mix the dry ingredients in one bowl, the wet ingredients in another, combine and fill your molds! You'll need to leave them in the molds for a few minutes before carefully removing and setting on a towel or some wax (non-stick) paper.

My favorite part of making these is the customization. If you have a friend that loves all things pink and glittery like me, you can drop some pink food coloring in the mixture and then put some edible glitter in the bottom of the mold before adding it all in. You can also add in scents if you have those or want to go above and beyond or even sprinkles. Definitely my type of craft.

3. Coloring Book
Now, this sounds really silly, I know, but this is another gift that is really popular right now. Adult coloring books. The designs are more intricate and complicated but I know a lot of people that enjoy these and you can certainly print out your own.

I spent less than 30 seconds typing "free adult coloring book download" and found tons of websites right away that have free to print pages. This page was the first to come up and it looks pretty good to me.

So simply print out some pages, make yourself a cover, and then you can either staple it or punch holes on the side and tie it together with string or ribbon. Easy mode activate.

4. Cookie Butter
This is for those that love to eat or have a huge sweet tooth. It's also for those that have a blender or food processor.

INGREDIENTS

• 2 cups cookie crumbs
• 1/2 stick butter
• 1/2 cup sweetened condensed milk
• 1/4 cup evaporated milk

First, you need to take some cookies--any kind will work, and crush them up. If you have a cookie with a filling like an Oreo, make sure you remove the filling. I find a food processor works best for this but you can use a blender or simply put them in a bag and take a hammer to them (I'm not joking--that's how I make a graham cracker crust for cheese cake). Once you have your 2 cups of crumbs, you'll want to melt your butter on a stove top and slowly pour in the two types of milk until they're all combined. Then, using a bit at a time, mix your liquid ingredients in with your crumbs.

Put that in a jar or container of some kind and bam! Cookie butter. You can put it on pretzels, crackers, bread--whatever. It's delicious. :)

Have any other ideas for easy gifts? Comment them or tag us in them on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram! :)