It's Christmas, Hanukkah or Chrismukkah, for those families who celebrate both, and with the joys of the holidays come gifts, gifts and more gifts. But can it get to be too much for the kids? Cast your vote and share your tips for keeping things within reason this holiday season.

By Anna Fader of MommyPoppins.com

As parents we are often looking for ways to make the holidays a little less about getting and a little more about giving. One way to do this is to host a toy swap. It's a great opportunity to teach the lesson of giving, make the holidays greener, help children in need, and clean out your closets a bit — all through a fun event that brings your community together.

I recently teamed up with another blogger to host two toy swaps in our neighborhood. Although we did this on a large scale, publicizing the events through our blogs and the local media, hosting a swap is easy and can be done as simply as gathering a few families. Here are some tips for organizing your own holiday toy swap:

Choose a location
A small swap can be done in a home or you can ask a local church or other community organization to let you use a room. Other than a room, all you need is some tables to put toys out on. Simple. We partnered with a great playspace, Kidville, to host our swaps. They generously provided the location, activities, and allowed participants to play in their gym, making the events an even bigger draw.

Invite your friends or community
You can make your swap as small or as big as you like. It could be just you and your friends, or your school, or you can publicize it to the larger community. The bigger it is, the more variety of toys there will be to swap — and more to donate.

Each year I'm faced with the challenge of buying multiple teacher gifts, and each year I struggle with ideas and how much to spend. What do you think is appropriate? Share ideas for fun gifts that don't break the budget.

If you have significantly more than $1,500 to spend this holiday season, you may be interested in some of the extravagant gifts from Neiman Marcus featured on Wednesday's show. If you don't, they're still fun to look at!