- We stayed home New Year's Eve. We didn't even open a bottle of wine as my stomach was a little touchy, so we have that saved for a future evening. I even sent DD2 to her friends with snacks already on hand in the house.
- Packed DD2 a sandwich and fruit between her warm-ups and the show choir preview. While a lot of folk were dropping off fast food and sandwiches from Jimmy Johns, she actually preferred jut a simple sandwich. DH made her mac and cheese when she got home for a heartier snack.
- I successfully washed two work jackets on delicate cycle, a very light dryer to get wrinkles out, and hung them up. I'm trying so hard to avoid the ridiculous cost of dry cleaners plus the chemicals. Since these were thrifted jackets, I felt I could give it a try.
- This was just luck, but the hotel the kids are staying at changed from the original plan so we changed as well. The new hotel will be $25 les for the two nights and still includes breakfast. As I will set DD2's hair the night before, it makes it so much more convenient to be at the same hotel. We also earned a few Orbitz dollars for a future hotel.
- I can roll over $500 in my medical flex account from 2018 to 2019, but since I didn't have the second throat procedure last May, I was at risk of losing a little over $300. I quickly used some to get a spare pair of eyeglasses, so should be good for a while, and the last on reimbursable knee ice, heat, support kit and high SPF Sun Screen.
I'll pack lunch today and snacks for both DD2 and us for the road tomorrow. I have vegan bean soup and chili in the freezer for DD1 who will be staying with pup for the weekend. I filled up my gas tank again at low process plus a coupon-always try to in town as it is regularly 8-10 cents a gallon less in town than in the cities. These little wins I hope to just do all the time and keep the spending low. How abut you? Any new savings wins for the week? Do you have some tried and true budget tamers to share?
It's so boring, but my best budget tamer is just saying "no." I have everything I need, and most of what I want, and I tell my kids that too.
ReplyDeleteYEs-a great tool for many of life's stresses. Still, when I need to spend, I hope to keep it as low as possible for maximum benefit. That's why the hotel change was so appreciated.
DeleteLike you, I try to challenge myself to push the limits of what we'll consider (e.g. not buy something we "think" we need, pack food for traveling, bring leftover groceries with us when flying, bring our own coffee when staying at a hotel, cancel our cleaning service, not paying for dry cleaning, etc). We've done all of these, but for each of them, at any given time, it felt like a big change.
ReplyDeleteWe're skiing tomorrow/Saturday, so I'm trying to plan lots of food options, so we minimize eating out. There will still be some, but the more I can prep, the less it will be.
We ate from pantry tonight. We'll have lunch before leaving for the show choir weekend, then take snacks for the room and for the competition and keep dinner light. I certainly don't need the mindless calories either.
DeleteWell done on not having to dry clean - I have even washed felt coats and hung them to dry then brushed any lint off afterwards and they came out fine. It's always a gamble but 90% of the time you would be ok to gentle wash. We have almost eliminated drycleaning - except for hubby's suits but he only wears them about 1 or 2 times a year now. All his dress shirts I was and he irons (I hate ironing). A frugal win this week was finding large bags of dog food - he is picky and I was previously told by another store that they only came in tiny bags. This is 4x as big - a definite frugal win.
ReplyDeleteI've thought about doing Chewy.com for pups food, but to maximize the savings, we would need to pend $40 and that would be a lot of his food here. It would be about an $6-$8 savings per month though, as even buying in one big bag, two delivered would be cheaper. If I reorganize some storage areas, perhaps. $70-$90m a year savings is pretty good.
DeleteI try to avoid dry cleaning and have washed many an item even wedding dresses and they have come out fine.
ReplyDeleteI figure those who sew understand fabrics better than me. I had good luck.
DeleteI used to really resent paying to have my ex husband's ties dry cleaned - it was about $22 a tie!!! And that was ages ago. So one day I decided to "see" if I could put them in the wash on the wool cycle. Oops. They came out shaped like a huge cabbage and I had to throw them away! To say he wasn't best pleased would be an understatement!
ReplyDeleteHoly cow-$22 per tie? My husbands tie's when he wore a suit for work regularly, were les than that per tie!
DeleteThis month I am experimenting paying cash for groceries. So far I have spent 125.00 out of the 400.00 budget and that includes a trip to Costco. Just had to keep saying no....
ReplyDeleteI'm debating a Costco membership this spring to prepare for grad party stuff. I worry though it will be too tempting.
DeleteDo you have friends with a Costco membership? For just a one time trip I would see if you could give a friend like 20.00 for a 20.00 gift card to use. I'm under the assumption that you can use a gift card there and pay the rest in cash. (I asked at the store in Maple Grove and gave my sons gift card but he hasn't used it yet). I do use my membership but business pays for it. Just a thought.
ReplyDelete