No Spend Months: Week 2 Review

After two weeks of no spend months, I am starting to notice a few positive things.

• I am figuring out how much food our family goes through in a week. This is helpful in that it will allow me to do better planning in the future.
• Our trash out put has dramatically decreased. It is perhaps 1/3 of what it used to be. This is also helped by being more diligent in composting and recycling.
• I am making a mental list of things we need. This doesn’t seem so good on the surface, but in reality it is much better than thinking of things I want.
• I am more appreciative of all that we have. If we were starting with nothing and did not have the resources to purchase items we would still have nothing. Everything that we have has come either from gifts or past purchases. I wonder what we would or would not have purchased had we not had the resources to do so.

Now for the weeks’ review…

Food

Spent: ~$70. My blood sugar issues have gotten worse as I have been eating more starchy grains and beans. This has forced us to purchase proteins in the form of grass fed beef and free range chickens. This is mostly for me as both my husband and toddler feel well eating lots of carbohydrates. I didn’t want to have to do this, but we both agreed that health was too important not to make these purchases. If I had to do it all over again I would have stocked our freezer with more meat. Everything else has gone fairly smoothly, except for the amount of work I am putting into meals. In order to keep a variety of flavors in our meals I have been spending too much time in the kitchen and am feeling burnt out. When I feel burnt out the best thing to do is simplify and that is what we will be doing with our menu this week.

Car Mileage

We spent $12.50 on gas this week. That seems crazy after such high gas prices, but I am not complaining. We drove maybe half as many miles this week as we did last week so we are on target for our goal.

Other Expenses

Spent: $73.50

We spent $40 in online purchases, $13.50 in mailing services, and $20 in health supplements.

Laundry

Total loads of laundry hung up this week: 0. I haven’t made this a priority. I haven’t given up on it yet, but I am also trying not to obsess about it when there are more important things or people to attend to.

Wrapping it up

Total spent: $156.00.

I don’t feel that any of the expenses we had this week were out of line. My husband and I seem to be keeping each other in check for the most part. “What about no spend months?” seems to be in our conversation weekly and it is a blessing that he is as interested in this as I am. I am excited to see how this will affect our loan payments over the next two months.

We begin week three.