The August of Austerity

There have been a few fellow bloggers who have done No-Spend months and reading about their adventures and successes have given me a big enough nudge to do one myself.

I think it’s a good idea to take a break from spending in order for one to realize how much they really ARE spending…..and I’m sure a lot of it is pretty much unnecessary.  Not only that, but that spending can become a fix. Nick the homebrew husband over at Northwest Edible Life wrote a nice post several days ago about the The Treat Spiral and the end of their No-Spend month.  Go check it out.

So beginning today, we’re not going to spend money on anything other than on a few pre-determined, pre-ordered or emergency items (being out of chocolate constitutes an emergency, right??).  Those items being the hay we are having delivered this month, the baby Cornish Cross chicks that I ordered (but won’t be paid for / delivered until the middle of August) and goat feed.  In cooler weather I could go a month without buying goat food, but the grain gets moldy in the muggy summer months and we can really only buy three bags at a time or risk it going bad. 

Other exemptions are any vital recurring household bills (basically just internet and electric) and fuel for the car & motorcycle.  Paul has been taking the motorcycle to work almost every day in order to save on fuel.  As logically-sounding as it seemed, there was a slight flaw; it left me with the car at home and I was starting to drive everywhere for any ol’ reason.  So I will definitely be driving less.

I did The Great Pantry Challenge back in January of this year and was able to “survive” then, so I’m just going to take it one step further and include all forms of shopping, not just grocery shopping.

It will give us the opportunity to pare down the items in the deep freezers.  This package says "Deer Steaks"...we haven’t shot a deer in three years.  I don’t remember buying any Lean Cuisine meals, how did it get in here?  What in gods name is that thing?  Is it meat or vegetable?   You get the idea.

It will also require me to do some sorting and rotating of stock in the pantry.  When the month is over, we’ll take inventory again and schedule a run to Aldi and Sam’s Club to restock.

And I won't be making any, "Oh since we're in town, lets just stop in the store for a yadda-yadda-whats-it."

So be forewarned fellow bloggers, the complaining will begin soon enough.

Paul's Take
She was complaining about it before it even started.