I’ve never been a fan of Black Friday. Instead, I wait until all the holiday hubbub is over to find the best deals.

It’s no secret that there are usually a ton of sales this time of year. Stores that overstocked for the holidays are trying to make room for new inventory by dropping their prices.

However, I generally avoid big ticket items in the days after Christmas. Why? I’ve found that prices fall even further in the bleak retail month of February. You may see sales on big ticket items right after Christmas, but the prices are nowhere near rock bottom. Retailers are counting on post-Christmas shoppers with gift cards to spend.

If you’re planning on dropping a big chuck of change, even if it is holiday gift money you’re spending, do yourself a favor and wait a couple months.

Smaller electronics and appliances that were overstocked for Christmas like DVD players, computers, and small kitchen appliances are likely to have big discounts this week. If you’ve been in the market for these items, now may be the best time to buy. Make sure you do your homework, though. Just because the deal looks good doesn’t mean it’s the best deal out there.

And don’t forget, now is definitely the time to shop for the holidays next year. We didn’t buy any holiday decorations this year, because we bought them last year at drastically lower prices (about 75% off). Then we threw them into storage to use this Christmas.

Look for holiday decorations, greeting cards, scented candles, artificial trees if it’s time to replace yours, and other holiday items that retailers are practically giving away. Now is also the best time to pick up calendars for next year. But hurry! The best items never stay in stock for long after the holidays are over.

Many of you are probably eagerly anticipating the great after Christmas deals this year. You may not have to wait until December 26 to get started, though.

Today is the deadline for most online retailers to ship items by Christmas. Even though the holiday is a few days away, online after Christmas sales will start tomorrow.

Most people are already done Christmas shopping (especially online), and they won’t start shopping for post-holiday deals until this weekend. Get a head start online in the next few days before all the best stuff is sold out!

Remember, though, only shop the deals if there’s something you genuinely need. You’re not saving anything if you’re only buying it because it’s on sale!

Now through Tuesday, you can use this link to get Yankee Candle tarts and votives for $1 each. As I’ve explained before, tarts and votives are a good opportunity to try a variety of scents. Even at the regular price, they cost just as much as the larger Yankee Candles per hour of burn time. Unfortunately, at the regular price of $1.99 each they’re pretty overpriced for candles. I usually stock up during these sales.

I received a printable coupon to take advantage of this deal in the store because I’m signed up for Yankee Candle’s mailing list. If you’re a candle person, I suggest you sign yourself up. They send deals like this one every few months.

If you didn’t receive this coupon in your inbox, you can take advantage of this deal online using the link above. The discount should automatically be applied to tarts and votives in your order. If not, use the coupon code XF810TS. Unfortunately, their shipping rates are a little high (flat rate $6 for orders up to $100), but if you plan to stock up on a lot of tarts it might be worth it even with the shipping.

Tarts and votives make a wonderful addition to Christmas gift baskets. Enjoy!

In August, Tony and I spotted a deal on cookware that was almost too good to be true. Originally priced at $200, the set was 50% off. We’d been looking for cookware for some months, and the amount of cooking we do would have made it a great investment. But we walked away from it to avoid blowing our first successful budget. In hindsight, I think we made the right choice.

Today, we stopped in at the Linens ‘n Things liquidation sale. I wasn’t expecting to find anything great. Last time we were in there, I wasn’t impressed. In my opinion, their prices were so inflated in the first place that even on sale they were still too expensive. But some weeks have passed, and the prices have been lowered even more.

The shelves were almost completely empty today. For the most part, I wasn’t impressed with what was left. Until I wandered over to the knives.

We have a knife set that we received as a Christmas gift a couple years ago. Unfortunately, the knives haven’t aged well. Some of the handles are even starting to rust. We rarely use them anymore.

Instead, we use a Chef’s knife that I bought Tony for Christmas last year. It was a fantastic deal at $25. It’s been a great knife, but it’s starting to dull. Though it’s a wonderful knife for what we paid, Tony has always wanted a high-quality knife set.

Today on the bottom shelf of the locked cabinet, we found a J.A. Henckels knife set marked down from $160 to $100. It was marked down an additional 20% off the liquidated price because it was missing the kitchen shears.

For $80, we got an extremely high-quality knife set including a Chef’s knife, paring knife, serrated utility knife, santoku knife, honing steel, and wooden storage block.

We decided a while ago that we wouldn’t buy a big knife set. Though our previous set had 10 knives, we never used most of them. Instead, we decided to buy a small set with just the knives we need so we could afford higher quality knives. This new set includes all the knives we use and none of the unnecessary knives that we won’t. Because they’re top quality they’ll last us for years.

The best part? Tony used $50 he received as a birthday gift last month to cover most of the cost. Since we never included that $50 in our regular budget, we’re only paying $30 out of our regular budget for these knives. To me, this is the kind of deal that’s too good to pass up.

If there’s a Linens ‘n Things closing in your area, I recommend you check out the deals. Even if you’ve already been there and you weren’t impressed, now might be the time to take advantage of lower prices as they try to clear out the store.

Just make sure you only purchase items you really need. Even an extreme clearance price is too high if you don’t need the item.