Wednesday, August 14, 2013

Planning for the Future

I've been trying to think of ways that I can carry on this project of simplifying, spending less, and living more generously into the rest of the year and not just for this month.  Here are a few ideas and goals I've been thinking about:

1. Only buy used clothes, hold more clothing swaps with friends, or buy a maximum of 1 new piece of clothing a season
2. Ask grandparents to buy activities for the kids rather than toys (ie. at our local community center) *hint hint.
3. Simplify birthday parties- make them festive with creativity and not with all the easy trappings of dollar store finds.  (This will be a tough one for me given my last two extravagant parties)
4. Plan ahead better for birthday gifts- thoughtful, simple, handmade, or fair trade
5. Try to simplify meals so that they are cheaper (any suggestions?  I think I gotta pull out that old cookbook: More for Less)
6. Use groupons and other coupons for date nights
7.  Keep kids birthday gifts to under $10 (as well as newborn gifts)
8. Find a way to make our home work for us for longer rather than getting a bigger home (unless it has a basement suite we can rent)
9. Have homestay students
10. Get involved with our local Refugee community (in the works)
11. Sponsor another child
12. If an appliance breaks, go without replacing it
13. Share, loan, borrow, and rent instead of own.
14. Annual garage sale where the profit goes to a cause.
15. For anything that is over $10-$15, look for it used first.

Any other ideas you have to simplify?

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