Money Challenges.....

At the beginning of the year I started the 52 Week Savings Challenge, this is my sheet so far:

Hopefully you can see; if not I have been concentrating on the lower amount weeks.  I also seem to be ahead of the game for some reason?  I have crossed off 16 weeks and from what I can see we have only gone through 11 weeks of the year so far?  So I may use the next three weeks to put together the $52 and cross that week off.  Once we have paid off the mortgage it will be easier to pay off the larger weeks.  We are down to week 23 this coming Friday until we pay off the mortgage.

I am still doing the sealed pot challenge.  I only put 5, 10 and 25 cents in my pot, but it's feeling a bit heavier than it was at the beginning of the year.  I am dying to open it to count the money; don't worry I won't spend it if I do!!

My Christmas pot is looking healthy; if you remember I put $20 in there a week and already have $260 saved up.  My birthday pot fluctuates but have $140 in there and my "other" pot has $400 in there.  I am currently saving up that money for the wood for the Fall/Winter of 2013/14.  I did just take $150 out of there to pay for the tickets to the Art Gallery Fund raiser we always go to, and I took $20 out of the birthday pot as well to go towards paying for them.

All in all though I am keeping up with the challenges which is a blessing.

I have also brought in $1,100 for the bringing in an extra $2,013 into the household this year.  That includes working and earning money from surveys etc.  So well on my way to completing that challenge as well.

My Amazon account is also up to $125 all due to Swagbucks, so that too is looking healthy.  My goal for the year was $250 in there, so already half way there with that.

Are you participating in any money  saving challenges?

Got a couple of things completed for this weeks challenges

I got the two drawers cleaned out like I wanted to:

Bill/junk drawer before:

After:

Then I have a "junk drawer" that I use exclusively.

Before:

After:

I have also made a start on the trying to bring more money in the house.  I put an ad on Kijiji to try and sell these lights:

I have advertised them as Fairy Lights that are ideal to use at a wedding.  I know they are Christmas lights, but as they are white and as they can be used both indoor and outdoor I figured I would give it a try and get $15.00 for all three boxes. Will say I was surprised at the response and I have sold them tentatively; I am  meeting up with a lady next Wednesday who wants them and is willing to pay the $15  and have another couple of people lined up if she falls through.

Another thing I am taking part in is Cindy's 52 Week Challenge.

 
 
It's pretty self explanatory, but one tip I have is to print out the form and cross off each week when you put it in your jar/pot.  I am trying to get ahead of the game as I have a feeling when it gets to $30+ a week it will be harder to come up with the money.  I am on week nine.  I love this idea and thinking I will have saved up $1,378.00 by the end of the year excites me. 

If you click on the link above the form you will find more details over at Cindy's.

I am still keeping up with the sealed pot challenge as well, just need to remind dh to put money in there!!!

Okay I will confess to slightly cheating........

As mentioned here, I am going to take part in Carla's January No/Low Spend Challenge.  So I have been stocking up on food items, granted they were on sale.  Bought a few books from Bookcloseouts, again they were on sale, and bought material, once again on sale.  

This material is for a baby quilt; I don't know the sex of the baby, and the mother is not finding out, so figured this was pretty neutral.  There are five flannel fabrics altogether:

Not sure if you remember the stool I bought the other week that needs to be recovered?  I picked up a metre of this material for $6 to recover it with:

It's a heavy weight tapestry and the lady was saying she also uses that material to make bags.

Now I do have a couple of bids in at the charity shop which I guess is spending that doesn't have to be done; but the money does go to a good cause.  Are my excuses making any sense yet?  I am sure I am not the only one who is doing this, am I?

I have been good though in putting my silver change in my sealed pot.  I have also started saving up toonies and loonies in my other pot; I use that money for when gardening season starts.  I am putting $20 away each week in both my Christmas and Birthday pots; and putting $50 away in my other pot, not sure what I am doing with that money just yet.  I know I generally pay for the wood for the fire with that (nearly $900) and any other big things that come up.

I promise though to be good through January and although it won't be a no spend January, it will be a low spend January!!!