Friday, September 13, 2013

No Spend September: Week 1

The first week of No Spend September went very well! We were away for Labor Day weekend so our challenge began on Monday 9/2.

  • We paid bills and allotted money to the necessary categories. 
  • My husband declared that he would not look at daily deal sites for the month of September. He loves them and finds all sorts of good deals this way but we don't want to be tempted to spend this month! 
  • I followed some of the techniques in this book and did some serious planning for a one-time grocery shopping trip and monthly menu planning. This took extra time but we can already see the savings! 
  • Cooked 14 meals plus spaghetti sauce, rice and some other meal components for the freezer. 
  • I miss thrift store shopping! We drove right by the Salvation Army while doing our monthly shopping. Funny--I don't go to thrift stores that often; maybe once a month, but when we are purposely avoiding shopping I want to go!
  • Same with eating out--we had several instances where it would've been so easy to eat out but I packed snacks to hold us over and we ate at home.
  • We did stop at Culver's for FREE one-scoop sundaes with coupons sent for Andy's birthday. Culver's not only sends the birthday person a free coupon but also one for a relative of the birthday person. So nice! We had to stand against the temptation of ordering a Butter Burger and I had a weak moment when I caught a whiff of onion rings. But we stayed strong and enjoyed the freebie without purchasing anything else! We didn't make a special trip to Culver's but stopped there when going by anyways. 
  • We've been careful to plan trips to make the best use of time and gas.
  • I hung some laundry to dry; also cut the dryer time down for other loads. Most dried in less time or I hung them on the back of a chair to finish drying. 
I'm sure there are other frugal things but that sums up the week! 

The first week went well so we're continuing onward!

3 comments:

Rhonda said...

I've enjoyed your posts this week. Hope your September is just as frugal as you need it to be.

About thrift stores, I used to shop at 3 of them every week. But this summer, I was just too busy with family and home keeping and never felt like going,
But I went to 1 last week and 3 today and got some great stuff. I don't expect I will be going back for at least a month though. There will always be goodies at the thrift store.

Debbie J said...

You are doing well and really thinking ahead. Good luck with the rest of September!

Kathryn D. Duke said...

great info...there are just two of us but we still need to be thrifty now that I too am retired. My childhood friend's grandmother used to feed three on one chicken in the 30's and get five meals from that one chicken...I think meals 1 & 2 were individual pieces (when one piece was a neck...my fav),meal three was chicken salad, meal four was hash, and meal five was soup/broth!!! But I am guessing the chicken was larger than our smallish ones in todays stores...but still, that is frugal!! I can only get three measl...one with parts, two chicken salad and three soup/broth.


Oh, I still want the "The Enchanted Broccoli Forest" and have only hinted for 8 years, heheheehee...