Money money money MONEY

So we are having some exciting money goings on at the Guercio home. First and foremost......
plug your ears.....

WEEEEEEE'RE DEEEEEEEBT FREEEEEEEE!!!!!!!

100%-don't-owe-anybody-a-penny-Brother Dave-would-be-proud debt free.

We have not been able to claim this since we left for anesthesia school Dec. 31st, 2005. And it feels great. Having said that, we now have the overwhelming tasks of planning for retirement, saving for kids' college and mission funds, and saving for 20% down on a house. Whew! Seems more overwhelming than that $1100 a month student loan payment we started out with in 2008.

So, it just so happened that our debt free status hit right around the first of May which ushered in our now annual No Spend Month. We did it last year and we're doing it again this year. Okay. I guess you know what annual means.

The basic idea is that you...wait for it...DON'T SPEND MONEY. Difficult concept, right? Not hard to conceive but hard to execute FOR SURE. We pay all of our basic bills (rent, utilities, cell phone, etc) and cut everything else down to bare bones or nothing at all. Eating out? No! Babysitter? Only if they're free. Not even a Redbox? Not without a free code and a commitment to getting it back on time!

The first week is easy. I've got my pantry stocked and my menu planned. I also live in a place with no place to shop so I DON'T GO SHOPPING. I literally have stopped looking at deals on the internet. Hip2save and slickdeals just had their affiliate sales plummet!

The hard part: the kids came home with a flyer for summer movies. 10 movies during the summer for $12.50. But you have to pay before the last day of school, May 24th. What should I do?! Well, it's No Spend May.

Grocery shopping is a very sensitive subject as well. The idea is to barebones it. Like Cogsworth says in Beauty and the Beast, "Glass of water, crust of bread!" We're not supposed to get crap we usually do that we don't need like cookies, chips, a cold 20oz Coke Zero at the checkout...But Ben and I are NOT good at this. So I try to seriously limit the number of trips to Walmart and say no to myself at least 9 times out of 10. (Now you know how weak my character really is!)

If you think you might want to try this I highly recommend it. The exercise of limiting yourself is so therapeutic. I was shocked last May at how often I had to stop myself from buying things I would normally just buy! I also learned to make due like the old single and broke days. When we ran out of something we could actually live without but just thought it would be terribly inconvenient, we waited until June. (ie: deoderant. Just kidding! I mean like printer ink) I'm relearning delayed gratification. I'm so spoiled.

Word of caution: do not pre-buy the month before! The idea is not to double spend April so you can survive May. I think it's fine to look over your house and make sure you're prepared with toilet paper and peanut butter just so you can exercise your no-spend attitude even more during that month but don't binge before the purge. I also made sure I paid our rent early and bought the few gifts I usually give in May, such as Mother's Day and a couple birthdays. Technically that's pre-buying (okay, cheating...call it like it is Ash) but surprise, surprise I'm not perfect in this.

I would also recommend choosing a good month, unless you're stronger than me, which you probably are. For example, December would be impossible for me. July would be really hard because it's summer, all my good feelings about the kids being out of school are long gone, and I generally pay people or places to entertain the kids FOR ME!

Soooo? What do you think? Can you stop spending for a month? It felt like an accomplishment last year on June 1st! Go for it!

Need a little inspiration?
Here is an actual statement from just over 3 years ago. Look how much progress we made in just 3 years!!! We owed more than $103,000. JUST IN STUDENT LOANS!! And we had already been working on it for about 2 years.