Surviving 'No Spend January'!

Yes, you read that correctly! The ladies who love to spend are going to refrain from spending for a whole month in an experiment entitled 'No spend January'. But, we are getting ahead of ourselves here, lets go back the beginning..
 

We are entering 2017 with our heads full of plans for exciting things to come, all of which could cost a lot of money. We have a trip to London coming up and Mimi is moving overseas, hopefully before the summer. I have two trips to the USA booked and need spending money (Sephora, I am coming for you!) Therefore we decided that we would try to reign it in for an entire month and only buy things that are absolutely necessary so that we can save up!. By absolutely necessary we mean, petrol, toiletries and groceries. No purchasing of makeup (sob), clothing, handbags etc. is allowed. Kill us now!

When we looked at our usual spending habits we were both guilty of frivolous purchases like coffee from Starbucks or Costa, magazines, unnecessary makeup items, popping into Primark and coming out £30 worse off, making an ASOS order for £100+, we could go on and on! We are not the best at budgeting and even worse at depriving ourselves of lovely things so we decided to put some rules in place to try and make this month a little easier;
 

• Take a packed lunch to work - no buying that M&S sandwich!
• Make use of the coffee provided at work (its not that bad, really) 
• We don't really need those ASOS sale items, if we liked them that much we'd have bought them already.
• Another pair of boots will not make the winter months any more bearable.
• Use the 5,000 lipsticks we already have, we don't need to buy more!
• If having a weak moment where makeup is concerned 'shop our stash', lets face it, it holds as much stock as Superdrug!
• Instead of spending money, do other things we love but that don't leave us £50 worse off, e.g. reading a book, watching NETFLIX, having a clear-out to sell on EBay - thereby making money rather than spending it!

So far (and as I type this we are only 4 days in) the main hurdle is that we keep forgetting! Just today I thought, 'I'll pop into Marks and Spencer at lunchtime and see if they have any nice jumpers in the sale' only to be brought back to earth with a bump when I realise I can't buy a new jumper this month!

So that's our plan, we will keep you updated as to our progress. We are lucky that we can monitor each other and talk each other down when we think we really need that new £40 eyeshadow palette. We expect that we will have healthier bank accounts in February, less 'new' items to clutter our home and possibly be a couple of pounds lighter due to lack of Starbucks and Marks and Spencer Food Hall visits!
 

As well as 'No Spend January' we are also indulging (or not) in 'Dry January' or, as its known in our house 'Absolutely No Wine No Matter How Bad Your Day Has Been January'. Wake us up with a debit card and a bottle of shiraz in February please!

Love Elle and Mimi x

Have you ever had a 'no spend month?'. How did it go for you?