June went by so fast. It feels like I blinked and it was gone.
This month was quite a bit different from other months for me. At the beginning of the month I gave myself permission to shop. This was also the first time my husband and I spent a night away from our kids out of town, and so we splurged a bit more than we normally do. We stayed in a whirlpool suite, ate all our meals out, took in a baseball game, and did some shopping. It was a much needed mini-vacation and we came back feeling relaxed and recharged.
And while it was fun to deviate from our normal frugal nature, it's much more comfortable to head back to our frugal ways.
I cooked from home a bit more toward the end of the month, which made up for our splurge in the beginning of June. My monthly coupon savings of $99.87 is indictive of two things: first I bought more fresh ingredients this month for which there were no coupons, and secondly, that I was a bit lazy when it came to coupon clipping. Our stockpile is still pretty strong, so I haven't felt the need to shop for many incidentals.
We also did a great purge this month. We joined our family's garage sale and were able to sell a lot of baby stuff and old electronics, plus make a little cash and have fun doing it! And we hauled a carload of items to Goodwill to be donated, which also felt good.
My husband is currently teaching two summer courses, which means a bit of a pay increase on top of his regular salary. Our biggest challenge for the summer is to not get too frivilous with that money, and instead use it to build up our emergency fund.
We feel very blessed this month, and look forward to getting back into the frugal zone in July.
How was your month? Were you able to stay on track? Did you get rid of any clutter in your life?
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Month in Review: The Splurge and Purge Edition
3 comments:
It's okay to sit back and relax from work and from frugal lifestyle once in a while. The only thing is that you make sure not to spend your year-long savings for a one night escapade.
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I am trying to pay off medical debt and have tried to stay on track this month as much as possible. Have resisted "summer" buys, clothes, garden things, etc. and have succeeded. I also had a garage sale and was able to unload a lot. This helps in buying more things, I am reminded that I sold some things that were not very old and obvious I didn't need. So I don't buy quickly anymore. Nice food bargains at the local market and have taken advantage of coupons and sales. Especially on brats and hotdogs so we can grill out. Even that feels good just to enjoy the summer by grilling. Have set a goal to pay off medical bills by December and hope to do it.
Got rid of quite a bit of clutter in the garage in June, either through freecycling or through our annual city cleanup day. There are a couple of things that I will sell for the extra cash. My husband works extra horus in the summer, too, but unfortunately he doesn't get paid more -- we just have less time to be frugal.
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