Recently my father moved to an assisted living apartment complex. It was getting too difficult for him to manage the upkeep of his home on a day-to-day basis. At first I thought it was going to be difficult for him to move into such an apartment complex, because he is a very active person, but he seems to really enjoy it. They assisted living employees always offer great activities for him to participate in and he gets to relax and enjoy his retirement instead of worrying about the upkeep of his home.

When my mother was alive, my father and her would always put together great gift baskets for all the family and their close friends. They worked for months in advance planning and baking so they could get all their creations out to everyone on their holiday list. After my mother passed away my family and I tried to help my father make them to give out, but we just couldn't get it all together. We were able to get a few baskets out, but the other people on the list were sent nut gift baskets instead.

It turns out that the people that received the nut gift baskets were really excited about them. They enjoyed their thoughtful gifts and called my father to thank him over and over again. Many of the friends that my mother and father had been sending the baskets to were diabetic, so the nut gift baskets worked so much better for them than cookies or baked goods.

So this year my father decided he didn't even want to try baking at all. Instead, he wanted to give his special baskets for everyone on his list. Unfortunately the price of purchasing that many of them was just too much for his budget. So we decided on a compromise of making our own to send out instead.

In the summer we set out on a mission to find discount baskets that we could use for our holiday gift giving. Surprisingly finding decent prices on them was not as hard as I had expected. We visited a couple craft stores and soon had plenty of the products for creating our gifts with. While at the craft store we pick up some clear wrap to cover them with and some decorative ribbons as well.

After finding the baskets the rest of the work was pretty easy. We purchased a variety of nuts for various online stores and our local supermarket. Then we scheduled a weekend to sit down and put them all together.

My wife and I had so much fun helping my father with his personalized holiday presents that we decided to purchase the supplies to make our own nut gift baskets for our friends and co-workers!

Making your own gifts for the people on your list is a creative way to get the whole family involved in the spirit of giving. Plus our nut gift baskets cost a fraction of what we normally spend on holiday gifts!