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A New Day!

June 2nd, 2006 at 12:59 am

Today starts the beginning of an experiment. I just finished reading Judith Levine's book Not Buying It. So interesting. It made me want to try something similar, but with 2 kids I figured I would have to modify it a bit. So instead of deciding not to buy anything non-essential for a year, I have decided to limit our spending to $100 each week until the end of Summer. I will re-evaluate then.

$100 includes groceries, clothes, activities, fees, entertainment, recreation and anything else that is outside our fixed monthly expenditures.

I really want to spend consciously. I want to think through what to buy and why instead of spending out of habit or because of other people's expectations. I want to have to plan to make it all work, kind of like a puzzle.

To make it interesting I gave DH, to be known as Big Rich, all my credit cards and my debit card. To get money I will have to go into the bank. I took everything but my Driver's License and health insurance card out of my wallet. Including my check book. The rational behind that is to think through my daily adventures. Plan. If I am going to the library I will need to retrieve my library card, etc. With gas prices the way they are, and driving the Beast (my 1995 Big block Chevy Suburban, paid for) I can't afford to waste any gas.

I have informed the Monkey's (my 2 boys) that we are trying an experiment. We are not poor, we just want to see if we can spend our money smarter. The elder Monkey is really starting to understand money and is quite interested in how it all works. A perfect time to teach him a real life lesson on value. There will not be many treats, there will not be toy purchases unless they are working toward a prize (eldest Monkey needs to quit coming into our room at night, youngest Monkey needs to potty train). There will more activities of the FREE variety and fewer of the COSTS variety. They seem to get it, we will see. The amazing thing is how many free activities I have already come up with.

Big Rich and I have always assumed that he is the saver and I am the spender. Of course I am the one that is responsible for 99.5% of the shopping duties and errand running in our home. It will be interesting to see how he handles not golfing as regularly or buying beer each grocery trip. Or when there is no junk food in the house.

Will I become the bad guy around here? Or will I freak out and go on a massive Target spending spree? Who will feel deprived first? What areas will we miss? What will we not even notice? Stay tuned.

3 Responses to “A New Day!”

  1. Homebody Says:
    1149212529

    I am trying to do something similar. I will be interested in reading about your adventure.

  2. simplygina Says:
    1149218821

    Great! It will be nice knowing there is someone in the same boat!

  3. StressLess Says:
    1149250935

    Glad to hear the book was good. I'm on the waiting list for it at the library. Good luck on your experiment!

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