I’m working on a $0 budget for Christmas this year. And now that I’m in the wrapping phase, I’m noticing some missing checkboxes on my list.
So my big question this morning was, “How do I stay at $0 — but still give something they’ll love?”
Make something cool!
My abilities redefine crafty. Well, they defy crafty anyway.
I remembered seeing this number puzzle in a textbook a few weeks ago:
I dissected it and came up with a formula for recreating the number puzzle using any numbers I wanted.
And I figured out how to make it so the end result would be anything — not just the number you picked at the beginning.
Personalized number puzzles as gifts!
So I’m taking each person’s “special number” and creating a number puzzle out of it. For some, that’s their birth year. For others it will be their favorite number or last four digits of their phone number.
And I’m making them into a pretty little gift sheet:
You can do it too.
I’ve put all this neatly in a spreadsheet so you can put in your own numbers — and make a number puzzle gift for your cherished math people!
This post originally appeared on The HSBA Post on December 17, 2012.
This year, money’s tight. But we’ve had tight Christmases before. And what I know from tight budget Christmases is that they’re a drag.
I know – giving isn’t the reason for Christmas. But it’s really fun to choose things for the ones you love that make their faces light up.
Nothing makes you feel like you’re celebrating Jesus’s birthday like having a family member say, “Oh, wow! This is the coolest thing ever!”
So when I first thought about how we were going to manage Christmas giving this year, I had a small idea: give things I already have.
I had no idea that small idea would grow to be huge.
“If you don’t use it, pitch it.”
I’m married to a professional organizer. So I constantly hear stories of his clients and the things he coaches them. The big one is, “Yes you could use it, but do you use it?”
I own a lot of things that I don’t use. But they are beautiful or special — so much so that I ignore the advice. I just can’t pitch them — or even donate them — because… well, because I just can’t.
But if I shared it, now that’s a different story.
Excitement welled!
As I looked around at the things in my home that are fabulous and unused, I got excited. I went from shelf to shelf, drawer to drawer, discovering all the cool things that I could give.
Then I thought about all the things in my mother’s attic. I gave her a call.
“How about a special Christmas gift for you, Ma?” I asked. “Can I come over and get all my boxes out of your attic?”
Now she got excited.
So last week I went “shopping” in Ma’s attic. All my old toys, books, crafts, clothes, and jewelry are going to find their way into hands that will love them like I do. And use them!
I’m recycling, reusing, cleaning out my home and Ma’s attic – all on a $0 budget.
And I’m celebrating the way Jesus would – by sharing!
How about you – are you on a shoestring budget or a $0 budget, too? Tell us about it in the comments!
Billed as “Your Child’s First Game,” this helps the little ones understand game play. Non-competitive, but fun. All activities are marked on the cards with pictures as well as words, so they are easily deciphered by the non-readers of the family.
Moving pawns or putting up fences. Deceptively simple. Ridiculously challenging after you and a friend have played 5 times. Which will your strategy be?
Ages: Ages 8 and up Players: 2 to 4 Review: Coming soon! Cost: $29.95 on Amazon
Helps children build equations and do advanced math using the basic operators. Players place their tiles in crossword fashion either horizontally or vertically to create valid equations.
Playing Rush Hour helps build sequential thinking, reasoning and planning skills. Challenges range from beginner to expert, so everyone in the family will enjoy it! Rush Hour can be played at home or on-the-go — perfect for on road trips, airplane rides or physician waiting rooms.
These tactile, colorful translucent Magna-Tiles stick to each other for fun 3D exploration or practicing basic shapes and colors. Magna-Tiles develops patterning, shape recognition, building and motor skills. They store nicely on the refrigerator too!
Complete the colorful animal pictures with geometric shapes. The 47 geometric shapes come in a rainbow of bright colors, and can also be used outside of the boards for counting, sorting and original designs. Great for developing shape and color recognition, fine motor skills and language skills!
Exotic, beautiful, and instructive, this “mathematical folktale” by author-illustrator Demi emerged from her love of India. This retelling of the classing “doubling” story is about Rani, a clever girl who outsmarts a very selfish raja and saves her village. When offered a reward for a good deed, she asks only for one grain of rice, doubled each day for 30 days.
This special counting book visually explores the concepts of factoring and the role of prime and composite numbers. The playful and colorful monsters are designed to give children (and even older audiences) an intuitive understanding of the building blocks of numbers and the basics of multiplication.
Last minute shopping? Me too! How about some of these math gifts for your favorite folks…
For Kids
Numb ‘n’ Number by Peter Weatherall – A collection of fun math songs.
Worms! What kid doesn’t like worms? And these are measuring worms!
For Grownups
Math T-Shirts by ExBoyfriend Collection – Sad? Funny? These are cute for even the “non-math” people.
Want something a little more fancy? How about math jewelry like this Fibonacci necklace!
For Families
Math games are great for full family fun – and games like Uno… well, that’s math too!
For Math Geeks
Old math books! Husband found a College Algebra book from 1947 for me – gave it to me as a “just because” gift. Here’s a Trig book by the same guy. You probably can get an old math book for your favorite geek at any second hand book store!
Math Music! The Klein Four Group’s instant download Musical Fruitcake CD (I just downloaded it, myself!) To give you a sample of how cool these guys were (they are now professors all over the world), here’s a fun Christmas song from them:
How about it – what are you up to for last minute shopping? Are you done?
Do you have any Pre-K and/or K12 kids in your family? I spent the day at Teacher Heaven on the Southwest Freeway in Houston, Texas yesterday and found some great math games!
I was there for the day to demonstrate math games and manipulatives and generally help parents and teachers of K12 kiddos with math goodies.
Meagan, Shantrelle and the crew had chosen a couple of math games to start me off. I also went and browsed the rest of the math section for others. By the end of the day, my table was jam-packed with math games!
I fell for the loss leader!
The big push at Teacher Heaven was the “fill-the-tub” sale – and I fell for it before I left. Hook, line and sinker!
I resisted too many goodies for myself, but made sure to do a little Christmas shopping. Here’re a few of my excellent finds. Luckily my family members a) don’t read this site much and b) don’t know that these things were originally shrink wrapped!
The Pre-K find of the day was inflatable number cubes!
I nabbed these number cubes early in the day to have something to get the little ones engaged as they walked in the door. They were so cool I couldn’t resist taking them home to Daughter.
They’ll be great for helping her identify the numeral and saying the word. Plus, I’ll be able to create a bunch of math games with it – like doing arithmetic with the numbers when she gets older, etc.
One K12 treasure was the Aba-Conundrums by Fat Brain Toys.
Aba-Conundrums comes with an abacus and a fun puzzle book. Using logic, you practice creating numbers and working with the tool.
I can’t decide if I’ll give it to one family member, keep it for myself or give it to Ma as a “house” game.
My other K12 find was the Check Math Game.
Also by Fat Brain Toys, Check Math is totally for my niece. I’ll likely open it and play it with Husband first, though!
You set the number pieces up and you capture your opponents pieces like checkers. The movement of pieces is a little different, though: a number piece can move to any square that’s a multiple of it. For example, the 2 can move to a 6 or 14. The 3 can move also to the 6 but not to the 14.
Time for Christmas shopping!
Pick up one of these math games at your local teacher supply store. And if you’re in Houston, head over to Teacher Heaven!
