No-Spending Challenge # 7

You know when you have a goal in sight, and there is a challenge under foot, it’s much easier to wade through the challenge as you see that carrot incessantly dangling. When there’s nothing to behold, it’s like wind-chasing.

So first with Christmas in the rears, it just seems like a great time to do another no-spending challenge. No, we did not go crazy at Christmas with lavish gifts and everything, but it was a month that we spent more than typical. And we felt it.

Second, we’ve been talking about moving for several years. Now we are putting some skin in the game. We are trying to save money for a down payment on a house, maybe a fixer-upper. I tend to be of the Dave Ramsey persuasion where you save up all the money and pay for a house out right, but my husband is not. We actually don’t have any fights about this, because I do realize if we weren’t living in the house that we had a mortgage on, we would be renting, and that seems more frivolous to me. So I am okay with a mortgage. But it would be nice to have as small of a mortgage as possible. You know what I mean.

So knowing these things, it just made going into our no-spending challenge way easier to start this time. Here are the parameters of our no-spending challenge, since we do spend some. It all applies to the grocery budget in this instance.

We are only buying perishables.
We are focusing on eating out of our freezer and pantry.
This will last for four weeks.
Even though this does not include non-food items, we are conservative and mindful of what we are spending in all other categories too.

Honestly, this is how we do things around here, but are usually stock up on the things we run out of. The no spending month, I don’t stock up on things like oil. If I run out, I have to find something else. This forces creativity sometimes.

We have been looking at our budget this month-something that is great to do at least annually. Some families do it every month, and some never. Make sure you know what you’re spending.

Anyone else want to join me on the no-spending challenge? I don’t wait until the beginning of a month or the beginning of a week. I started this on a Thursday in the middle of January. If you are doing to do it, just do it!

If you are interested in reading other challenges, check out below.