Gearing up for a no-spend August

[Hopefulmama]

DH is actually on board with this. I have tried in the past and he never went for it. However we are trying to pay off a few bills and we could do it if we buckle down for a month or two. Any tips or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. I like to have a solid plan before starting new things. Right now I am trying to meal plan and use a lot of the food in our pantry. No going out to eat, no convenience dinners. We HS so there will be no back to school clothes. Our cars were just repaired and are in good shape. Hopefully nothing major will arise. What have you found to help keep you focused and on track?

[micah_mae_]

We need to do it too, I've never participated before so I have no advice!

[justmama]

We will be doing a no-spend August as well aside from normal food shopping and the few school supplies we need.  Bills are tight for the second month in a row and there's NOTHING leftover and maybe not even enough for normal expenses.  So it's a necessary no-spend for us, which really stinks.

[MamaBookworm]

I think we need to do this. We are not exactly big spenders, which is why I think we always got away with not being too careful with our money. But in an attempt to build a budget, we started tracking our receipts with Moneywell. ZOMG. We have 2 or 3 receipts EVERY SINGLE DAY. And they are nearly all for food. We live around the corner from a really nice food co-op, so at least I can say that I'm spending money on local, organic, sustainable kinds of things.  But seriously, sometimes we'll go to the store twice in a day. It really adds up. My pantry is seriously overstocked with specialty items. (DH loves to cook.) We must be throwing away more than I realize, because there is no way two adults and a toddler are eating $800 worth of (mostly vegetarian) food in a month, right?

I definitely need to do some meal planning to tackle our food budget. The other area we impulse buy in is luxury coffee and alcohol. 

Anyone have a resource for once a month cooking that includes veg gluten free stuff? 

[Hopefulmama]

http://onceamonthmom.com/ has menus for veg and GF OAMC.

[MamaBookworm]

Sweet! Thanks!

[AnkaJones]

Hi,

We need to do this too.  We were making tons of progress on our debt, then we moved and got really lax and unfocused.  We haven't gone any further into debt, but we're taking a big cut in income at the end of the year and need to have our debt paid off by then (plus a whole new set of habits to keep us within our means).

Last week we got back into the meal planning groove.  This week I need to make some freeze away dinners so that if we don't feel up to cooking we have an option other than eating out.  And we just need to cut out the impulse buying.  I signed up for Swag Bucks to get some extra flow, but watching a bunch of advertising is really bad for me :(

Anka

[MichelleZB]

We're no-spending this August! We are seasonal workers who don't start again until October. The summer funds have run out and we're dipping into the line of credit for bills... not good.

Time to eat the pasty in the pantry and not buy anything.