I'M BACK!!!!!

Okay, so my New Years resolution involves getting back to my blog and back to my frugalicious shopping habits. Apparently, since the birth of my fourth child, I have been able to get nothing accomplished ever, including blogging, shopping, couponing, cleaning, laundry, organizing, brushing my teeth, etc. Now that baby is 5 months old and sleeping through the night, I plan on getting back to business and back in the money-saving game. One of my favorite blogs, Money Saving Mom, has challenged her readers to an "Eat from the Pantry Month." She has done this before for a week or even two at a time, but never for a month. Seeing as how we spent a little extra money just before Christmas and haven't been real great at sticking to our frugal budget, I decided that I was going to join her in this challenge. For the next month, I am going to budget only $30 a week for my family of six for groceries, toiletries and diapers. We have LOTS of beef in the freezer and are stocked up on diapers and wipes for a few weeks, so that will help tremendously. In order for this to work, I went through my pantry and came up with a meal plan for the entire month of January. We will buy mainly produce, milk and eggs for the next four weeks, allowing us to save $330 by the end of the month!

I have also been very motivated by fellow bloggers and their personal financial goals. For instance, Money Saving Mom and her husband have saved up for the past seven years and are going to pay for their first home with cash! Can you imagine?!?!?! I'm not going to get quite that crazy, but one of our personal financial goals for this year is to get our vehicle loan paid off. I am going to come up with some very specific goals and timelines and post them on my blog from now on. I think that by sharing our financial goals, it will help me to be more accountable and in turn, more frugal with our money. Remember Dave Ramsey's tag line: Live like no one else, so that later you can LIVE like no one else! Let 2010 be the year that you cut up your credit cards, pay down your debt and take steps towards FINANCIAL PEACE!