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I was mortified recently as my daughter and I divvied up her collection of Littlest Pet Shop toys to send to her younger cousins. I was trying to mentally calculate how much we must have spent to accumulate all of them. Granted, some were birthday or holiday gifts, but we had to have bought at least half of them... and that couldn't have been cheap. While she did enjoy them, I would guess if we compared the cost by the number of hours she played with them, I would be berating myself some more.

My dad always said that we played more with the boxes than items came in than with the toys themselves. Once again, I had to learn things the hard way.

So here is my frugal, creative holiday shopping idea for parents of young children: give your kids a box of boxes.

Several years ago, Santa gave my daughter such a gift and it's one of the few Christmas gifts she still uses to this day. I'll admit she wasn't jumping for joy when she opened them, but once she and her friends figured out how useful they were, they became a favorite.

You can buy a set of 50 small boxes from shipping supply firm Uline for about $40 plus shipping. That's probably more than you need (or have room for), so divide them up with another parent. A half order should be plenty.

These boxes are about the size of double bricks and can be used for making forts, doll houses, guinea pig racing courses, jumps for kids or dogs... and of course a playland for Littlest Pet Shop figurines. (Yes, ours have been put to each of those uses and more over the years.) Artistic children can paint or decorate them.

And when they finally outgrow them, you'll always have a box on hand for mailing those unwanted dolls or toys.

Gerri Detweiler – Personal finance author and Credit Advisor for Credit.com, Gerri contributes budgeting, debt recovery and savings information online. She is also the co-author of Reduce Debt, Reduce Stress: Real Life Solutions for Solving Your Credit Crisis.