As I said earlier this month, I joined my sister-in-law, Lauren, on a
spending fast. What is a spending fast? Basically, you don't buy anything for a whole month. Well, you don't give up everything. You give yourself a grocery budget, can fill your car up with gas, and pay your bills, but other than that don't spend a dime. No eating out, no craft store visits, no trips to Target, no Amazon purchases. Sigh.
Last year, when Lauren posted about her spending fast, I thought that it was a great idea and probably wouldn't be that hard for me. I could do that. I mean, Brad's in school so we're in the stage of our lives were we are poor college students. We have to be frugal and not buy things. How different from normal life can it be? I'm not saying that this wouldn't be incredibly hard for other people. I'm truly impressed that Lauren does it when she has three kids.
However, when Lauren called out for people to join her this year, I will say I had second thoughts about how easy I thought this would be. One, we're having a baby. I've wanted so badly to start buying things for Scoot. Two, along with having a baby there are certain things I've been wanting to make for the baby, like quilts, blankets, decorations, and a crib mobile. A spending fast doesn't exactly allow for a craft budget. Third, groceries cost so much out here versus how much they cost in Utah last year. For example, our $1.97 gallon of milk in Utah costs over $4 in Pennsylvania. I was worried about keeping our groceries within a budget.
But I decided to commit to the spending fast. One month, on a grocery budget and no extra purchases. It wasn't as easy as I thought. By any means of the imagination.
It all started the night before the spending fast. I was getting ready for bed and turned on the bathroom nightlight (for those 3 am pregnant lady bathroom runs) when the light burned out. At 11 pm. I'm in my pjs and there is no way I'm running to the store to buy a lightbulb before the spending fast begins. Plus, it's not really in the true spirit of the spending fast. The idea is to live with less. I thought I had a few extra lightbulbs, but I couldn't find them. I begrudgingly decided I wouldn't buy the replacement lightbulbs during my grocery trip on Monday and go the whole month turning on the bathroom light in the middle of night and waking me up even more.
Then a few days later, the same sort of lightbulb went out on my sewing machine. Truly desperate this time, I did a deeper search for the extra lightbulbs. Turns out, I was right. I did have them. They weren't where they were supposed to be, but I was able to fix both my nightlight and sewing machine. While this may seem small, I'm glad I stuck to not buying anything. I was able to make due for the few days that I needed to without what I wanted. And I also learned I often have what I need if I look hard enough.
Groceries were also tough this month. The first week was great. I came in under budget. I was elated that I had done it. During week 2 came the perfect storm. We ran out of EVERYTHING. Trash bags, paper towels, toilet paper, dish soap, plastic wrap, printer paper, AAA batteries, Q tips, shampoo, vitamins, kleenexes, flour, sugar, just to name a few. All basic things you don't have to normally buy for awhile all finished off in one week. Some of these I could live without, others are true necessities. Also, it was Valentine's that week. We had planned just to do a romantic dinner at home so I had planned a few extra grocery dollars for that. All these things made me double my grocery budget for the week. I haven't ever spend that much on groceries in one week out here. And I overspent during the spending fast. Talk about disappointed with myself. So, during weeks 3 and 4 I tried extra hard to stay within the rest of my budget. And at the end of the month, I'm twenty dollars over. While I'm a little sad I didn't make it within budget, I learned I could keep a grocery budget as long as I don't have to buy all my basics in one month.
Something that did help me not spend anything on the baby this month was to go make my baby registry. I could pick out all the cute and adorable baby things I wanted, but I didn't spend a dime. It was a little overwhelming with all the baby things, but in a way I feel a lot more prepared for Baby knowing that everything is picked out. I did spend money on one thing at Babies R' Us. Our friends had their baby a few weeks early so I picked up a gift for them off their registry while I was there. Kinda cheaterish, but I don't feel bad about it.
My final hurdle for the month has been to not have a craft budget. I've had a million craft ideas for Baby's nursery flying through my head. Like some adorable quilts I've been wanting to make. But what pushed me over the edge is that we are going to Utah in March. And if we are going to Utah, there is a family friend who can machine quilt the blankets together for me. But that would mean I'd have to have both quilt tops done by the time I arrive in Utah. And I didn't have enough of one fabric to finish one of the quilts. However, I had some yarn left over from
Baby's blanket that I needed to return. So, I returned the yarn and bought my fabric for the same price. Well, I was over by 31 cents. A little on the cheater scale, but now I'm going to be able to finish my quilts in time to go to Utah.
I think the best thing that kept me on track was that we sat down before the month started and made me a budget sheet. Ok, Brad sat me down and made me go over the budget with him. I'll be honest, he's the much more budget conscious of the two of us. Our budget sheet had all of our expense categories listed and what our budget was for the month. A little sad to see so many zeros on the sheet, but I will say it was by far the most helpful thing for the spending fast. I was able to see how I was doing on groceries and spending on gas. I'm going to have Brad keep making me one so hopefully I'll carry on a little bit of the spirit of the spending fast.
All in all, the spending fast was great. Hard, but really good for me. It made me realize how often I would spend money without thinking about it. Or I would think that we really needed it when really we could make due. We'll see if I can do it again next year after we have the baby.
