Friday again! This week flew by between Halloween falling on a weeknight and the neighborhood dinner we attended last night. For those of you who are new, this idea to celebrate frugal wins for the week came from Katy at The Non-Consumer Advocate. 

1. My son wore the same Halloween costume (Toothless from How To Train Your Dragon!) for the third year in a row. I got it big initially, and it’s just a jacket, so it’s been an easy repeat. He also sometimes just wears it as his normal cost, so it’s seen a lot of use. Unfortunately, I think he will finally outgrow it before next year. 

2. Decided not to wait to pull the trigger on a “no spend” month. We are headed to Hawaii in just a couple weeks, so there’s no way November will be a zero spend month, but I’m going to see how low we can get our spending regardless. 

Like when I broke my habit of buying lunch every day by giving myself a monthly spending limit, I’m doing the same thing for ALL of our spending in November. Separate from the mortgage and daycare, because those are completely fixed costs, I’m giving myself $1500 to spend for the month, or $50/day. 

Since we do have a big trip coming up, I’m going to need to horde cash until then to make sure I have enough to get us through the rest of the month, especially since we have to pay for our car rental when we pick it up. So far so good though. The first two days were zero spend days, and I expect today will be as well. 

If you’re interested in following along, I’ll be posting daily updates on Instagram to keep myself accountable. 

3. I pulled out some old jewelry to wear to a friend’s wedding. I had forgotten I’d owned a specific necklace, and now I’ve worn it three times in the last week and I’ve gotten the same satisfaction out of it as if I’d bought it new. I’m now 9 months in to a clothes-shoes-accessories buying ban and it just keeps getting easier as I get used to shopping in the back corners of my closet instead of our at a store. 

4. I finally planted my garlic. This is the first year I’ve replanted garlic cloves and seeds from last year’s crop instead of buying new (other than what had reseeded itself in previous years). Heirloom garlic isn’t cheap and I’m glad I’m finally getting out of the cycle of purchasing a new crop every year. 

5. I didn’t buy lunch once this week, though one meal did consist of an apple, a little cheese, and a frozen yogurt of questionable age (but tasted just fine). I keep enough random food at the desk to make sure I won’t have to completely skip lunch if I forget it at home because then I would just end up buying lunch. 

What are some of your frugal successes this week?