Does your Christmas budget have you in the doldrums? Are you looking for a couple of cheap, homemade Christmas gifts to make for your family or friends? But you want to find homemade gift ideas that will be loved and appreciated?
Because, let’s face it, sometimes homemade gifts suck.
One time, as a joke, my sister made my grandma probably the ugliest sign ever. She just took a leftover piece of 2 x 4 from our garage, painted it peach, then painted ‘Welcome to our Home’ on it in hideous lettering. She finished it off by hot-gluing a couple of bunches of brightly-colored silk flowers from the dollar store to either end. Seriously, it made me laugh until my sides hurt!
My sister just wanted to see how my grandma would react. My grandma is very elegant and stylish, and she had just professionally decorated her house.
When my grandma opened the hideous sign, she sort of choked down a laugh and immediately handed the sign and wrapping back to my sister and said, “I don’t want that!” My grandma didn’t know it was a joke, so her reaction was honest, and we still laugh about it.
If my sister hadn’t been joking, though, how would she have felt about that reaction to her gift? She probably would have cried!
It’s very important that homemade gifts be useful and beautiful.
My gift list is always bigger than my budget, forcing me to be creative and crafty in order to stay within my budget. If there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s making amazing DIY Christmas gifts.
The very best way to save money and stay under budget is to use your own two hands. Those hands will save you some serious dough.
I addition to costing less, handmade, DIY Christmas gifts mean a whole lot. They say, “I care enough about you to take time to create these homemade Christmas gifts just for you.”
Here are several thoughtful, homemade Christmas gifts:
Easy Handmade Soap: A Tutorial for Beginners
I enjoy making soap, and I’ve given it to friends and family members for Christmas more than once. It looks cute to wrap a stack of bars in a piece of cellophane then tie it with raffia. One year I gave a bar of soap with a festive tea towel, tied with a cute card that said, “Here’s ‘Soapin’ you have a Merry Christmas!” to all of my neighbors. Everyone always appreciates it so much and they often request it. These soaps make great DIY Christmas gifts!
Your grandma called and she wants these cuties on her fridge so she can show off her family to all of her friends who come over to visit. They are such easy and cheap DIY Christmas gifts that you have no excuse not to make these!
These homemade Christmas gifts remind me of my grandma because she keeps sachets in all of her drawers and her clothes always smell lightly floral. I love the way Kenarry uses rice and essential oils in addition to the dried lavender, to give her sachets a bit of heft and extra fragrance.
Fill your home with nature’s wonderful aromas by making your own scented mason jar candles. This DIY Christmas gift is inexpensive and doesn’t use any hazardous chemicals!
The fresh scent of pine cones add to the Christmas feel during the holidays. There are many ways to get that scent linger in your home, but the best way is to make mason jar candles using pine cones. Not only do they smell good, they make pretty decorations too!
This is so beautiful and cozy-looking, I can hardly believe it was made, start to finish, in only 45 minutes. This site contains a very simple video tutorial. This is one DIY Christmas gift idea I will definitely try!
If you’ve ever purchased these delightful luxuries at Lush, you know that they usually cost $5 – $10 each. With this tutorial, you can make an entire batch for under $3! Package up a jar full for under a buck, and add a tag (free printable at this site) for an easy, cheap homemade Christmas gift.
Doesn’t that sound warm and summery? Pair a jar of coconut lime sugar scrub with a couple of grapefruit bath bombs (link above) for the ultimate summery luxury. What could be better during the dead of winter? The Idea Room has lots of other sugar scrub recipes for you, and free printable labels for your cheap, handmade gift.
Can a person ever have too many tote bags? You need one for the beach/pool, and an extra large one for the library, and one for church and one for your laptop and one for board meetings and one for each kid’s music lessons… Nope! This site has 260 FREE tote bag patterns so you can find exactly the perfect one to give as your cheap handmade Christmas gift.
Make your own canvas portrait with just a photo, a small canvas, gel medium and a paintbrush. This one is so easy, you could turn it over to your kids. I don’t know about your kiddos, but mine love to get in on the crafting action. Isn’t it beautiful?
Speaking of easy gifts that kids can make, here are a bunch more (Gorgeous!) cheap homemade gifts for kids to make.
Related Reading: Gorgeous Gifts Kids Can Make
If you have an old sweater lying around, instead of throwing it out, try making this hat! This beautiful hat would make a lovely (and totally free!) homemade Christmas gift for a friend or loved one. You may even have enough sweather left to make a matching pair of gloves or infinity scarf.
Share your favorite quote with one of your favorite people, for just a tiny investment of time and money. Seriously these instructions look so simple! I’m betting this will be one of your most popular cheap homemade Christmas gifts.
These ‘picturesque’ tile coasters are much more durable than the photo coasters made with mod podge. These can even go in the dishwasher! The instructions look amazingly simple, too. Be sure to read all the way through the instructions before starting, though, as the photos need to be printed with a certain type of ink. What perfect homemade Christmas gifts!
Last year I made about 60 of these. I founded a charter school with a friend a couple of years ago, and as board members we wanted to give a ‘thank you’ gift to the teachers and administrators. However, our budget was almost nonexistent. So I found a whole stack of gorgeous dishes on clearance (for $0.59 each!) at Target, bought a tube of E6000 glue, and whipped up a bunch of adorable cake stands. I topped each with a package of mint oreos and a canister of Stephen’s mint cocoa, then wrapped them in cellophane. We even had enough money left over to hand out gift cards. And the teachers loved these homemade Christmas gifts!
The chalkboard portion of this serving tray is brilliant for parties and get togethers! Do you know someone who loves to entertain? This serving tray would be a fantastic homemade gift for them.
Handmade Christmas Gift Ideas for Girls:
This tutorial for a little girls fabric headband takes under 30 minutes to complete. It takes a mere scrap of fabric and a few inches of elastic. This makes an easy and inexpensive (or totally free if you have a scrap of fabric laying around!) homemade Christmas gift for a teenage girl.
Fabric Flowers for Barrettes, Headbands and other Accessories
Fabric flowers are very popular because you can use them for lots of different things, from jewelry to hair accessories. It is way cheaper to make them than to buy them. Using scraps of fabric, you can make them for free, or you can pay from $5-$10 per flower from the store. This tutorial is also great for up-cycling old fabrics like an old t-shirt, ripped tights and ribbon. Little girls will be thrilled with these handmade Christmas gifts!
Artsy DIY Bracelet from Upcycled Plastic Food Container
If you grew up in the 80’s, you’re probably already familiar with the awesomeness that is Shrinky Dinks. Well, you don’t need to purchase all of that expensive Shrinky Dink plastic, you can do the same thing with the plastic containers from your local bakery. Just wash them out, follow the instructions at Rust and Sunshine, and create your own unique and beautiful DIY Christmas gifts.
Here is another simple yet gorgeous bracelet for you to craft for a stylish girl. Sometimes a simple little bracelet is all you need and these beaded wristlets are a great project for any beginning jewelry maker. I love the unique beads on these, and the leather straps. What fun, easy handmade gifts!
Look how beautiful and vintage these pendants look, especially with the black and white photos the creator used. I love the one on the right with the sheer ribbon. These beautiful necklaces are under $2.50 to create. These are awesome, cheap homemade gifts.
I love the vintage feel of the fabrics, the quilted bib, the ricrac trim, the pleated pockets and pretty much everything about this darling apron. This pretty apron is one of the best homemade Christmas gift ideas!
Homemade Christmas Gifts for Kids:
This site is in French, but these masks look pretty self-explanatory. It looks like felt, cut to the correct size and shape, and hand stitched together, with an elastic band to wear around the head. Any young person would absolutely love to have one (or the whole stack!) of them for make-believe play! What darling homemade Christmas gifts!
This would be the perfect gift for a child to take along to church on Sundays, on a long flight, or anywhere that she needs to be quietly busy for a couple of hours at a time. I love that the doll is so easy to dress and has multiple outfits. My girls are in love with this homemade Christmas gift idea!
Oh, adorable wee tiny mice with itty bitty teddy bears! What little girls wouldn’t love to play with these? They would be so easy to accessorize with tiny mouse nighties and dresses and little felt food? Can you tell that I think these are absolutely adorable and want to make myself a half dozen? These look like they require basic sewing skills.
This little guy is just made from an old glove and a bit of stuffing, with minimal sewing skills. He has pipe cleaners in his body, so you can make him stand or sit. And he’s adorable! Use an old glove that has lost it’s made, and this adorable squirrel is practically free! This site also sells patterns for an elephant, a bunny, and other animals that would make perfect homemade Christmas gifts.
We play Rory Story Cubes regularly as part of our homescool Language Arts, but I’d never thought to make up our own set of story stones. It’s brilliant and what a perfect, cheap homemade gift! These stones will provide hours of imaginative, storytelling play for all ages. Simply choose a stone and let the pictures spark your imagination!
I love bathtub toys because I usually bathe my kiddos in the evening, usually following a chaotic and none too peaceful dinner. Why is that time of day always so hard? Anyway, a little bathtub play helps us end the day on a positive note. These bathtub paints look super easy to make and will be homemade Christmas gifts appreciated by both your recipient and his/her mom!
How cute is this teepee? The room it’s in is pretty darn adorable, too! But let’s not digress. If you know a child who would love this particular homemade gift, you should know that it’s totally easy to make, using fabric scraps, and that it’s creator spent less than a day and $7 whipping it up. No kidding!
And never underestimate the power of the gift of time and attention in the form of coupons. Children might not be too impressed by a coupon, but I guarantee it will mean a whole lot to your Grandma!
I hope you’ve been able to find at least one homemade gift you want to create. If you’re still looking, check out the Homemade Gift ideas on my Handmade Gifts board over at Pinterest.
Is your Christmas budget tight this year? How to have an AMAZING Christmas on a tight budget.
Merry Christmas!
Pin all of these terrific ideas for handmade Christmas gifts for later!
Not gonna lie: if I got soap bars for Christmas I would be heavily disappointed. 😂
Lol! Homemade soap (from raw goat’s milk) is a much requested gift from my family members. To each his own, huh?
Fantastic gift ideas heree! Really funny!
I love handmade headbands. They’re just always so cute and customizable.
We love them around here, too. I have five girls, so we’ll just go to town and spend a whole afternoon making cute headbands. Pretty much all homemade Christmas gifts are fun, huh?! 🙂
I totally want to make the soap, sugar scrub, and that adorable blanket! I didn’t even know you could knit using your arm! Thanks for this awesome list!!
I didn’t know about arm knitting, either, until I put this list together. I’m going to buy some of that giant yarn and give it a try. It looks so cozy, and like the absolute perfect homemade Christmas gift!
These are awesome ideas!! Great list!
I LOVED this list. Saving for later because I always want to try homemade gifts, but don’t want to give people crap they don’t want or won’t use.
Hi Marie! I’m glad you don’t think this list is crap that people won’t use, lol! Homemade gifts can be a lot of fun!
Mason oil jar is AWESOME AND I love the knit. These are all great ideas.
I love those oil jars, too! They are at the top of my list to try out!
I love these ideas. I always want to make things homemade, but have no idea what to make.
Glad I could help! Homemade Christmas gifts are so much fun!
these are great ideas – I love homemade scrubs!
Me, too! And this coconut lime scrub looks especially delightful!
I love the idea of gifting a DIY sugar scrub! These are awesome, thanks for sharing 🙂
That’s a great idea! Who wouldn’t appreciate a homemade scrub?
I will be making the arm knit blanket! It looks like an awesome gift!
I agree — it’s beautiful! I need to make one for myself and one for each of my sisters. Share a photo when you’re finished!
These are WONDERFUL ideas! I’ve always wanted to make my own soap at home – you’ve given me a little boost of motivation to get it done! 🙂 Great article!
You’ll be amazed at how easy and fun soap-making is! And it makes such a fabulous homemade gift!
I LOVE giving/receiving homemade gifts!! Thank you so much for these wonderful ideas that I’m definitely using this year!
Homemade gifts definitely make me feel loved and special! I’m glad you can use these ideas!
So many clever ideas here but I just love that wee mouse tin!
I love them, too. I think I’m going to save all of my mint tins and make at least a dozen wee little mice to live in them. We have a 16 hour flight to China coming up, and I think if I tuck a tin in each of my kiddos pockets it will keep them busy for awhile on the plane. Homemade Christmas gifts are so much fun!
Wonderful Ideas you’ve shared! I love handcrafted gifts. Not everyone can/will appreciate them; however, those who can, recognize the added value/sentiment from the thought, time, and effort that goes into these special gifts.
Thanks for sharing.
Me, too! Homemade Christmas gifts always make me feel extra loved and special.