Another successful week done for the No/Low Spending and Decluttering challenge this month! My most expensive day this week by far was Friday. I sent $156.45 to World Health Fitness via the bank bill payment system to get out of that $#%&! contract they locked me into, and then spent $9.41 to have my cancellation letter sent to them via registered mail. According to Canada Post they signed for the letter this morning (signature is visible online), so I know they have it. After sending the letter, I went to Starbucks (bad me, I know). I lost my Gold card in December, and I recently received its replacement in the mail. I spent $2.05 for a tall blond roast and spent a little time unwinding answering comments on the blog. After spending so much mental energy on the gym, I wanted to unwind. I’m not counting the $2.05 towards my grocery challenge because the money on the card was put there back in early December when I last reloaded it. It’s already spent money. The only other spending I did this week was $7.16 for some groceries this morning. That puts me at $173.02 for the week, not counting the pre-paid Starbucks. I would have been happier if it was only $7.16 for the week like it should have been, but I’ll live otherwise.
Providing nothing else pops up in the next ~2 weeks, I’ll have $700 to put on my line of credit this pay period. I’m going to keep trying for my $2000 goal, but it’s going to be tight.
The financial mini challenge this week was to generate some extra money. I opted to give my basement clean up a boost and took my (former roommate’s) pop bottles and cans in to the bottle depot. Four bags of assorted recycling yielded a net payout of $31.40.
The decluttering challenge this week was to clean out the junk drawer at home. It’s a great challenge, save for one small issue: I don’t have a junk drawer. I’m a very visual person, so I try to keep things where I can see them. As a result, I tend to stick things in piles on flat surfaces rather than in drawers. The usual suspect is the coffee table, which I cleaned up last week.
So, instead of taking a pass on this challenge I turned it into an extension of the first one: make more money. One of my close friends lives in a two bedroom condo with her husband and their (adorable) infant daughter. She’s commented a couple times that they don’t have enough space, and that they have too much stuff. Those of us who have been bitten by the decluttering bug are pretty aware that those two problems are heavily linked. When she mentioned wanting to declutter and get rid of some stuff, I suggested we host a garage sale at my place in May. I don’t really have enough stuff to host a garage sale on my own, but between the two of us we’d have more than enough stuff. This week I went through my closets and started putting aside items to be sold. This is the pile so far:
When we finish up the garage sale we’ll load up the cars and take the remainders to Goodwill to be donated.
How are your financial and decluttering goals going this month? Has anyone achieved their goals yet?
Recommended Reading: Getting Back to Being Frugal
Good stuff!!
I envy you having no junk drawer! lol! I like your extension of the challenge! I’ve never had a garage sale but think they’re an awesome way to drum up some extra cash!! 
They really are! Then at the end of the day I can donate the rest of it and rest easy knowing the stuff is going to a better place where someone else can use it.
I think co-hosting a garage sale with your friend is a great idea! And only $7.16 for some groceries? You are on a roll Cassie
Here’s hoping I can keep it up!
Hi Cassie! I still can’t believe all that crap you had to put up with when ending your contract with your gym! Honestly, I hear so many horror stories about people getting scammed into long-term contracts! I’m sorry you had to pay for it!!
Congrats on your weekly decluttering challenge! 30 bucks from recycling pop cans?! That’s pretty damn awesome!
Good luck on reaching your $2000 debt repayment goal! You can do it!
My former roommate drinks a LOT of bottled and canned beverages, but doesn’t recycle them himself. We agreed when he first moved on (and they started piling up), that if I took them in I’d get the money for them. I made over $100 from that alone in the time he lived with me.