Gift Occasions Calendar for the Year

Who this is for

Every present of the year on one page. Set each month's birthdays, festivals and anniversaries against the people they are for, give the month a budget of your own and see where the spending bunches up.

Anyone with a long list of family birthdays, religious and cultural festivals and anniversaries who wants to spread the cost and stop missing dates.

What this helps you track

• Every gift-giving occasion, month by month, with its date
• Who each gift is for and what you plan to give
• Your own budget for each month and what you actually spent
• The busiest month for gift spending
• Which months' gifts are bought and which are given

How to use it

1. Write the year and the household the calendar is for.
2. Go month by month, writing each occasion with its date, the recipients and a gift idea.
3. Set a budget for each month from your own figures, then write what you spent as the gifts are bought.
4. Tick bought and given when every gift for that month is done; the totals, the busiest month and months outstanding are worked out in the browser and the workbook.
5. Look a month ahead at the start of each month, so gifts that need posting go in time.

Formats

• Printable PDF (A4 and US Letter)
• Fillable PDF with form fields
• Fill in online, saved in your browser
• Excel / Google Sheets workbook

The printable is laid out inside a box that fits both A4 and US Letter, so the two files are identical and neither one is scaled. The fillable PDF has real form fields. The workbook uses plain formulas only — SUM, IF, COUNTIF and the like — so it opens in Excel, LibreOffice and Google Sheets without anything breaking, and every calculated cell is grey so you can see which figures it worked out.

How to print

Download the A4 or US Letter file to match the paper in your printer, open it in a PDF reader and print at 100% — not "fit to page", which shrinks the writing space. Both files leave a 14 mm margin, which clears the unprintable edge on home printers. To print the online version with your entries in it, use the Print this sheet button, which prints only the sheet and none of the page around it. More on printing.

Questions

Why one row per month rather than one per occasion?

So the budget for each month sits in one place and the year's peaks are easy to see. Write several occasions in a month's row, separated by commas; the gift budget by person spreadsheet covers the detail per recipient.

How is the busiest month found?

It is the largest monthly budget you entered. The sheet does not suggest what to spend; it only shows where your own figures put the most pressure, so you can move some buying earlier.

Which occasions should I include?

Whichever you give gifts for: birthdays, anniversaries, religious and cultural festivals, teachers at the end of term, weddings and new babies. The calendar is blank so it fits any household.

Can I carry it over to next year?

Most dates repeat, so copy the occasions and recipients across and clear the spent and tick columns. The browser version saves in your own browser.