Tag: budgeting

on (mostly) buying nothing for a month

// Thursday, May 1, 2014

My buy nothing month (inspired by this post, among others,  over at Our Little Apartment) has gone quite well for me. I made two non-food related purchases, excluding the plane tickets I had to buy recently for a summer trip (the costs kept going up, and it didn’t make sense to wait; I’m stupidly excited for July): pens at the very beginning of the month when I hadn’t really accepted I was going to succeed yet and the iTunes version of the MTV Presents Unplugged 2012: Florence + the Machine album. I shouldn’t have done the iTunes purchase, probably, but (1) one slip up won’t kill me and (2) it (I’m rationalizing, I know) made sense because I had a deal through my AmEx card that if I spent $5 on iTunes I would get a $5 statement credit, so I bought the entire album for essentially $5, and I’ve been wanting it for a while. A fifty percent savings seemed too good to pass up, rightly or wrongly. But overall, I’m quite pleased with how well I did, though I think I might have spent more on food than normal? But I’m okay with that right now.

It also made notice some things about my other spending habits. I’m going to keep along a similar vein for May, but instead of Buy Nothing, it’s going to be a “Buy Only Necessary Things and Don’t Buy Non-Social Coffee” (I need a new pair of sneakers, a lightweight jacket I can run in, and maybe but not definitely a new pair of sandals). I’m also going to do my damnedest to limit myself to purchasing coffee only as a social thing (when I’ve made a coffee date, etc.) – that is, no treats because I know it will be a long work day, or because I’m extra tired, or because I don’t feel well. I have perfectly delicious coffee at home (truth: Tonx is the best), and spending $4 a cup for no particular reason is both absurd and a habit I need to break. I’m also going to cut down on how much I eat out. I by no means eat out excessively or expensively, but it is definitely something on which I need to work.

I’m not sure whether there’s a correlation between buying less and doing more enriching things, but this past month I’ve liked myself more. I’ve spent more time outside; I’ve started running again; I’ve finished one book and started two more; I’ve made progress on knitting (did I mention I’m learning to knit?! I’m learning to knit. I’m making a scarf, currently, which I realize is the most seasonally appropriate thing I could make, I know, but it’s helping me get used to the motions of knitting); I’ve been better about writing posts, even if I haven’t been better about posting them. I think the last month has just made me more aware of how I spend my time; when wandering around the target or the mall isn’t something I want to do, I have to tangibly come up with things, versus passively fall back on shopping for lack of anything better to do. I think it’s been healthy for me. I didn’t shop often anyways, but it definitely became a habit; I’d be bored and not want to clean or sort paperwork, so I’d go to Target instead. I feel like I’m much less inclined to do that now, and I’m pleased. So, yes. Continuing the spirit of Buy Nothing Month for May, though I’m definitely tweaking it a little this month. I’m enjoying it a lot more than I thought I would, honestly. It’s nice.

Anyone else want to do a Buy Nothing month with me in the future? Alternatively, if you’ve done one in the past, did you have trouble? What, if anything, was your biggest problem area?

springtime! (see also: how is it already april?)

// Tuesday, April 1, 2014

The small, small part of me that’s still an inner child* wants to make some April Fools’ joke, but I’ve never been particularly good at them. (That said, I’ve been very well fooled a few times, usually by my dad, the most notable of which was when he convinced me on a Saturday that the school district had arbitrarily decided to hold classes because of snow days, so I got up and got dressed and was literally about to walk out the door to wait for the bus, and he was all “lolol no, got you!” Mind you, I was about 7. So there’s that.)  Instead of an April Fools’ joke, however, I want to wish you all a “rabbit, rabbit, rabbit” so as to bring good luck. For those who aren’t familiar, saying “rabbit, rabbit, rabbit” on the first of the month is a thing. Even though it has British origins (according to Wikipedia, but I wasn’t able to find much else, honestly), it’s also definitely somewhat New England specific (maybe because it’s British?? because, New England and all of our ~history?), because as I’ve grown up and the areas from which I know people have widened substantially, I’ve gotten some very odd looks when I’ve said that first thing in the morning – or, alternatively (and much more often the case), loudly proclaimed, “Oh, shit. Rabbit, rabbit, rabbit!!!” at about 10 o’clock at night on the first of the month. I’m not superstitious, per se, but it’s enough of a tradition in my family that I feel bad when I forget.

This winter has been a long one. I  realize it’s been spring officially for a little over a week now, but somehow the transition to April feels more like spring. I (along with my roommate) did a bunch of spring cleaning this weekend, and when I woke up this morning to our wonderfully sunlit kitchen (at some point I’ll post a picture but I don’t have a good one readily available), it felt like spring, in spite of the fact that it was still in the upper thirties (but it’s gotten pleasantly warm out today! Northface Apex softshell and no scarf at lunchtime, though admittedly I was wearing a hat).

It gives me hope, though, that we’ve moved to longer days and I can wake up to a sun-filled kitchen and the knowledge that I don’t (hopefully maybe probably) need to wear my winter boots anymore. I can’t wait until I can comfortably wear dresses and cute boots, or even just jeans and Sperrys (which I’ve only just recently converted to wearing, see also: excellent vacation walking shoes). Mostly I just want to not be cold all of the time. On that note, this weekend – as a part of the spring cleaning – I also spring-ified my room, changing over my duvet cover to this floral one from IKEA, largely because there is no way in hell I can justify $150+ on a duvet cover and shams, and this one comes with a duvet cover and two shams for $40. It’s definitely not the highest quality, but it’s definitely not bad for what it is. Oddly slippery, though.

Anyways, the point of all this is simply to say happy April. I’m looking forward to a month of sunshine and going to the symphony twice (!) and drinking good coffee. I’m officially starting my ‘Buy Nothing Month’ now, which for the sake of my sanity is limited to material things** (that is, some entertainment, like $20 BSO tickets, is allowed) and coffee purchasing is to be significantly reduced but not eliminated. I’m excited. Tangible positive steps forward are wonderful. And this is two-fold, because not only do I want to reduce frivolous spending, but I want to save up for a nice camera and camera bag, which are both things I’ve had my eye on for quite some time.

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*I am pretty sure my inner child has been somewhere between 45 and 90 since I was about five, but whatever.

**excluding one necessary thing, which is a birthday present for which I have not yet purchased the materials, and since said birthday is in April, that is something I need/want to do.

on things i’ve been thinking about recently, or: a post before vacation*

// Friday, March 28, 2014

I leave for vacation in less than twelve hours*; I’m going to the Caribbean for six days and I’m very much looking forward to it. I’ve been ‘attempting to pack’ for the last four days or so, because I come from a family of compulsive overpackers (one time, when I was 11 or 12 and my mom and I went to Florida for a little less than a week, we brought – in addition to presumably more clothes than we could possibly need – my two American Girl dolls, our Razor Wheelie Scooters (the basic ones with the wheelie bar on the back, and we justified bringing them because they ~collapsed~), and somewhere between 8 and 10 Nancy Drew books for the trip (I read 3 on the way down, I think; somehow we both overlooked the fact that I should be reading more difficult books, clearly).) Nowadays, I can be on either end of the spectrum: I’ve used a Rothko Messenger Bag [in khaki], which I love, for weekend trips to NYC/weekend trips in general for the last two years, but I’ve also been known to pack a full duffle (this, in pink and black, which is also what I’ve used for my last three trips; I’m able to pack a LOT into it) for a weekend. Incidentally, that’s the duffle I’m packing for this upcoming week. (Sidenote, I’m also bringing this backpack from LLBean, which I just got in blue and with which I am kind of in love.)

But my point is this: in thinking about packing and making lists and winnowing down lists (Do I really need eleven shirts for six days? No, no I do not), it’s occurred to me just how easy it is to accumulate far too many things.

I recently happened on to the blog Our Little Apartment because I wanted to clarify a cold brew iced coffee recipe, and somehow I ended up reading ~four years of her life. Her blog (which is fantastic, and I now highly recommend it) has such a focus on being frugal without being obsessive about it. I came across a couple of different posts that really resonated with me, from discussing Target as a guilty pleasure and way to kill boredom, to how she allocates her family’s budget, to how she’ll be the bag lady sipping a latte. I’m inspired by her ‘Buy Nothing Month’ posts; that’s definitely something I should do once in a while.

Anyways, my point is this: now that I’m going on vacation for a little less than a week and then will be back and feeling like I shouldn’t spend money, I’m going to say that April will be a ‘buy nothing’ month for me. What that means, essentially, is that I am limited to spending money on only necessary items (food, bills, house items like paper towels, etc.). I’ll definitely do a few posts in April detailing how that’s going. I think, overall, I do pretty good re: purchasing, but there are things on which I should work. I’m also going to limit myself to purchasing at most one coffee per week; the k cups at work won’t kill me if I run out of time to make coffee at home before work.

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*I left for vacation March 14th. It’s now March 28th. This post was 99% finished and I forgot to add the links and post it. Yes, I am the worst. Yes, I am going to backdate it in about a week but I’m still going to leave these asterisks here. So there’s that.

ps: a vacation post will be up soon. vacation was the most wonderful.