Thursday, February 2, 2017

a penny saved is a penny earned

I've declared February as a No Spend Month. I don't have much reason for it beyond wondering how much I really spend on unnecessarily and impulse purchases. In general I am very money conscious and don't overspend anyway, but I want to see how much I can save. I started the month off on a good note by only paying $2.50 for a pair of brand new Paw Patrol shoes. (Annabelle wasn't impressed with my money saving skilz. All she cared about was that they didn't light up.) So far I haven't spent 1 cent on unnecessary items. As they say in AB's music class, "Good job, me!" No need to remind me it's only February 2nd and I have 26 more days to keep this up.

Here's a tip for anyone considering a No Spend Month of your own- don't go to clothing websites "just to look around." DO NOT TEMPT YOURSELF. You'll fall in love with a gray dress covered in watercolor birds that doesn't qualify as a necessary purchase. It's basically a steal but Annabelle already has summer clothes and you're trying not to go overboard with new outfits. But it's so cheap its almost like saving money instead of spending it! It's helping the economy and the country you love! Buy more and help the country more! I can justify anything!



Speaking of spending money reminds me of the Christmas dishes I bought at Goodwill last weekend. I went in for something to decorate our mantle and came out with 58 gold rimmed dishes for which I paid only $5. I don't where I'll store the dishes but I couldn't pass up such a steal of a deal. I still need to find a home for the china my aunt gave me over Christmas. I went from having one set of every day dishes to nearly 90 new pieces in the last month. I'd host a dinner party but that would require getting the dishes out of Christopher's car. I looked at them tonight and the box they're in now houses paperwork, a jacket, a dirty tshirt, a glass container, a set of keys and a hardhat. So they're being put to good use. 

  
In other random tidbits, Christopher booked me a massage for tonight. Between the two of us he's the massage lover but he knows I've been stressed lately and very sweetly wanted to do something for me. I like massages fine, but if I go a whole year without one I don't miss them. I'm not a huge fan of a stranger rubbing my body for an hour. I'm constantly touched by a toddler so I'm not lacking human interaction. The massage was scheduled to be an hour and half (45 minutes past my comfort zone) so I was a little concerned about how it would go. I considered asking the lady to massage me for 45 minutes then let me sleep the rest of the time. 

I was also concerned about the talking issue. I never know if the massage therapist wants to talk or not so I spend the entire time worrying that I'm either being rude by not talking or breaking some no-talking rule if I do talk. Nothing about it is relaxing. Christopher said it's not much a talking situation but he falls asleep if he lays down for more than 4 seconds so he's not really a reliable source. He doesn't stay awake long enough to socialize. The massage started off very quietly with Amelia asking what I do for work. I said I stay home with AB and asked if she has kids. She said she doesn't because she hasn't found The One and "it takes two to tango and I don't tango often and don't want to dance with the wrong person." It struck me as so funny for some reason and I couldn't stop laughing. I met her 7 minutes earlier but she was filling me in on all the personal details of her life. We laughed the entire time and I think that did me more good than the actual massage. She covered a variety of details including sports and sports viewing snacks, teaching inner city children to golf, her stepmother, her stepmothers cat, her teenage brother, bees, school and slugs. I wouldn't have minded a few minutes of quiet, especially when she was talking about the mating habits of hyenas ("most people don't know how weird they are with their partners") but overall it was an enjoyable experience. 

I'm glad laughter is free. I would have needed to break into Annabelle's piggy bank to pay for all the laughing I did.

1 comment:

Jen said...

Haha what a massage experience! You're right though, they can be terribly awkward.