Make a friend of the dollar bin...

I love to give flowers in the winter. 

Sometimes, I will already know one part of a gift, such as flowers, but I want to make it more interesting and substantial.  You can do this without hurting your pocketbook, by keeping your eyes out for some good deals in the dollar bin. 

I found some great things in the dollar bins at Michael's. 

I loved these reusable bags.  They actually set the theme for the whole gift.

 I also found these hand-held garden tools.

 ...and these chalkboard plant markers that included the chalk.

 You may have to be willing to make what you are looking for, when you can't find it.  I wanted matching garden journals.  I found these stickers that match the bags, but I needed journals to put them on.  After digging a little deeper, I found these yellow striped journals discounted to $1.50 because they were out of season. 

I simply cut the stickers, and placed them on the journals so that they would cover the sand dollar. 

I also bought herb seed packets and a bag of wildflower seeds from other dollar bins.

Add the dollar bin items in with some other items you wanted to invest a little more in...

 ...such as herb pots, an aspirator, garden gloves...

...and what ever fresh cut flowers are in season.

Strategically place your items in the bags...

 ...and now you have a gift that looks like you just came from a flower market.

Who wouldn't want a little bit of Spring in the middle of winter?  

Now which ever garden lover you give this to will have a bit of Spring at three different times- fresh cut flowers while their indoor herb garden is growing and then wildflowers blooming in the Spring.

After everything is said and done, $7 of dollar bin items pulled together the whole gift.  So much better than just flowers.