Nothing New/Mindful Spending Week 44

[Ginevra]

The "rules" of this challenge are self-defined. Anyone can join in at any time. The aim of the challenge (for me) is to combat consumerism, wastefulness, mindless buying, and overspending. It is meant to nurture creative problem solving, ecology, frugality, intentionalism, and resourcefulness. To support these goals, I seek to buy nothing new. I aim to use existing resources, borrow, hand-craft, and buy existing second-hand materials to the greatest extent possible. However, I recognize that life is unpredictable, and family life increases this factor exponentially, so I will buy new in the following cases, when a non-buying option does not present:

 

Food, health, and necessary household goods excluded.

Requirements for school, work, or health and well-being which cannot be obtained used.

Gifts, when a creative non-commercial option will not suffice.

Anything animal or gardening related that cannot be obtained used.

Fuel/energy sources.

 

Posts will appear each Saturday, referring to the week that is ending. Post your successes, creative solutions, relapses and weak moments. It doesn't matter if you have a weak moment! Just keep swimming!

The big win this past week was with our old van, which I've mentioned in these threads before. We had been dithering over whether to get a newer car or try to nurse the van along, though the transmission was clunking and probably needed very expensive repairs. I finally decided that, even if the transmission costs a few thousand dollars to fix, it would still be far less money than a newer car would be. So DH took it to a transmission repair guy. The guy asked if it was low on fluid, and DH said he didn't think so; it looks full. The guy asks if DH turned the engine on to check the fluid. Well, we didn't know this was something you are supposed to do. So, no.

 

This was the problem, people. It was very nearly out of transmission fluid! The guy poured almost four quarts in! And now it is running like a top. He charged DH $20. :D The car turned over 200,000 miles the next day.

 

I bought more craft supplies for the co-op Christmas Craft Day.

 

I bought a Game of Thrones grown-up coloring book for DD for Christmas. Also got her the boots I talked about in my other thread; and then bought myself the same boots. :D I also bought socks but haven't decided if they are for her or for me. :) I did a Costco run today and also picked some things up at Target, just household goods and some food items.

 

Oh! One other thing; I bought a pair of Christmasy PJs for myself. My Bunco group does a Christmas party every year and we wear PJs. So this will be fun. :)

[prairiewindmomma]

Hurray on the van!!!

 

I fixed our Dyson vacuum this week. It's 8 years old, and dh thought the dramatic decrease in suction was just the vacuum showing its older age. A particular piece hasn't sealed properly, and I was able to fix that! $$$ saved!

 

Other than birthday presents and groceries and paint and supplies for the living room, no extra purchases! We are slowly painting the house ourselves rather than hiring out the work. This should save us about $3K. I am still going to pay someone to paint our 12' ceilings when that time comes, but I am hoping to not do that for a few years!

[prairiewindmomma]

Oh, I take that back. I just remembered I bought a usb cd/dvd reader this week. Our old laptop died and I bought a drive to extend the usefulness of our school netbook rather than buying another laptop.....

[Desert Strawberry]

Yay on the van! That's great!

 

We got a new hot water heater installed, no cost to us. It's magnificent. I hope the one in our new house is half as wonderful. 

No progress on the house. I think I may have ticked off my cousin. My kids got sick with a stomach virus, then I got it. That was our week. I will talk to him Monday and see if we can't close Friday.

 

D got word that he's being furloughed for a week between thanksgiving and Christmas. Not great timing for a week with our pay. We are hoping he can use that plus two weeks of vacation to work on the house. We won't be able to do everything we wanted (new floors, New paint, finished bathrooms, etc). But we hope to be in by Christmas. There's a ton of work to be done. I hope we can get started soon.

 

I just got home from shopping. Food, a few items for Luna, a new, pink, extra small, $3 collar for my 4pound Daisy dog. I managed to add baby leg warmers, tights, socks along with sweaters and jackets she already had to her warm weather wardrobe to make it into a cute winter wardrobe. I bought the new stuff for $1 each.

 

Food is expensive. I splurged a bit on wine, bought 3 bottles on sale. Stocked up on cheese on sale. Loaded up the fridge. We're using our beans and rice stores, but I still spent $150 :(  Maybe I should look at it as freeing up cash for the extra stuff we needed. I hope my kids don't devour it all in three days. 

 

I bought 6 hoodies in various sizes for my boys for $1 each off a buy-sell-trade list. While I was there, I got the perfect diaper bag for 50 cents. 

Gas is super cheap. Under$2 a gallon. That makes me happy.

[MomtoCandJ]

Let's see, ate out a few times, bought dh's Christmas gift, bought some of dd1's birthday gifts, bought the wood to go on the back of the cabinets you can see in the living room and pipe to fix the kitchen sink. I think that's it, next weekend we go to my mom's to deliver Girl Scout cookies and so they can throw a little party for dd1 since they won't be able to make it down.

[Desert Strawberry]

Oh! I forgot! I bought Halloween decorations on clearance, fall decor(table cloths and wreaths) on sale, and I bought advent calendars for$1.50 each. Nothing was over$3. I am ON this holiday thing.

I also started baking bread. If I can keep up with it, it should help with or food costs.

[SKL]

Had to replace my computer. It's a business expense, but still....

 

Didn't spend as much as expected on charity this week, mainly because the options I expected were not available. Will surely make it up later.

 

This week I will need to complete my order for my kids' nut fundraiser, which will be some hundreds of dollars.

 

I put some Christmas gifts in my Amazon cart and will probably place an order this week.

 

Not much else comes to mind.

[Annie G]

You guys all had some good wins this week!

 

Dh and I just returned from a hectic trip to his aunt's funeral. Dh's mom has some dementia and his aunt was his mom's only sibling so we really needed to be there for her.  It's an 1100 mile trip one way...and flying was just too much hassle.  But on the plus side, I was able to surprise my sister for her birthday.   Money well spent- gas is pretty cheap, only had one hotel stay the whole time and that was half covered with loyalty points. Food- we bought two breakfasts out on the road and pizza to have with my sister. Nearly five days and that's all we spent- awesome. 

 

Life is good. I got to check on my dad and see my sis, and dh could be there to support his parents. 

 

Fun story: My college age kids stayed here at home and thought they smelled gas one night and called the fire department. Turns out they were smelling a skunk.  Firemen were really sweet about it, and totally understood. A week ago a guy's house blew up because of a gas leak- he died and his house moved 18 inches off the foundation. So yeah, my kids decided better safe than sorry.