Hellobee

I have written several posts about my financial goals for 2017, which I broke down with specific goals for each month of the year. Overall, the goal is to give myself a healthier relationship to money, and to reduce our spending and consumption as a family.

January: Retail Detox

The goal for January was a bit nebulous: Think hard about every single purchase. Don’t pull the trigger unless I have deemed it essential to me or my family in some way.

How did I do?

January was really an opportunity to reframe my thinking about retail purchases. I’ve never been a crazy-frivolous shopper, but looking back on all the things I have bought over the years—clothing, makeup, housewares—I am working on the realization that most don’t bring me long-term happiness. Sure, I get a little retail high from hitting that purchase button, but what comes next? The guilt of buying another unnecessary item that I am likely to discard, use up, or donate within a few years. Plus, the knowledge that the money I spent could have been put to better use as savings or investment, or paying down student loan debt.

I unsubscribed from all of the marketing emails I receive (for some reason Sephora still will NOT stop sending me emails no matter how many times I hit the unsubscribe button—they know my weakness!); I gave myself rules for buying stuff online and in stores and I chose to stay home and eat Mr. Cotton Candy’s cooking (and occasionally mine) as often as possible. My favorite tip to encourage thinking before I buy: whenever I run across a product I want to buy in a blog post or discussion in a Facebook group, I bookmark it or add it to my Amazon wish list. Then, I go through my bookmarks and wish list on a semi-regular basis and remove things I no longer want. If something stays on my list long enough, then I may find a way to fit it into my budget.

In the end, my personal spending for the month came to $76. I don’t have an exact breakdown, but I would estimate the expenses were mainly from dining out. This was really good for me. On average last year, I spent ~ $300 a month on personal spending, which included dining out and alcohol, clothing, beauty products, home and DIY products, entertainment, and miscellaneous spending. I was able to take the difference of what I usually spend and put that toward my student loan balance. It felt good.

February: No Online Shopping

For the month of February, I thought I would take the detox one step further and ban myself from online shopping altogether.

How did I do?

I had two cheats. First, I saw a deal to get 12 issues of The New Yorker for $6, so I purchased it without thinking before realizing it technically violated my self-imposed rules. (But such a good deal!) Second, I spent $200 on a vintage mid-century dresser that I found on Craigslist for baby #2’s nursery; we will use it to store baby’s clothes and as a changing table. It’s debatable whether meeting up with someone in person and paying in cash counts as online shopping, but I did find the item online, so I’ll take the fall.

My overall personal spending in February was not as good as January. During the first two weeks of the month, my morning sickness and food aversions were at a high, and I spent around $100 on fast food and snacks. Ugh. So unsatisfying. But I got through it! During the second part of the month, I purchased (in-store) a pregnancy body pillow (OMG, those things are $60!?) and two items of maternity clothing—a dress for a wedding I will be attending in April, and some shorts for the ridiculous Texas summer that I am about to suffer through as a preggo. It hurt spending this money with my new mindset, but I knew these were practical purchases that I would benefit greatly from.

March: Secondhand Shopping

This month I was not allowed to make purchases unless they were bought secondhand. They could be from Craigslist or a Facebook resale group, a garage sale, a consignment store, or a thrift store. Because this was mainly about retail, I chose not to include dining out in my ban for this month (that will be coming up in a future month!).

How did I do?

I didn’t end up buying much at all this month. I did buy some baby gifts for friends who are due in June at a nice secondhand store—I was able to score a like-new Ergo carrier for a big discount, as well as some Aden + Anais swaddling blankets. I ended up cheating a few times: I bought gift-wrap supplies from Target due to all the birthday parties and showers we had on the calendar (around $7). I also spent around $45 on gifts for children’s birthday parties (some from a local toy store, some from Target—lots of birthday parties this month!). I bought a book for my book club ($12) because the library wait list was taking too long. Finally, I ordered some microfiber cleaning cloths from Amazon, though I used Amazon credits and didn’t spend any money on those.

As far as overall spending, I did splurge on eating out a lot. I have no real excuse other than continuing food aversions from pregnancy and the beautiful Austin spring weather, which has had me craving time dining out on patios. I’m seeing that eating out is my biggest spending weakness, so it will be interesting to see how I can curb that going forward.

Up next: April is meal planning month! I will be using every strategy available to me to save money on groceries: couponing, using up what we have, cooking large batches and eating leftovers, and stretching meals with clever tricks (like adding black beans and corn to taco meat). In May, I’ll be taking an inventory of food and household supplies, research prices, and order some necessities in bulk. And in June, I’ll work on renegotiating our bills, such as internet and cell phone, and deciding whether it’s time to cut out any subscription services we might be using. I’ll report back in three months!