Our Family's Start Towards Frugal and Simple Living

In my earlier posting about Financial Independence and Simple Living there were some baby steps that I was determined to start in these few months.

My Clothes-Buying Ban

So far, I have been successful for the half month of September and October although temptations were abound. It forced me to really look at my closet and go through all the stuff that I have. It is incredible that I have cupboard loads of clothes and somehow I always seem to wear the same things or I complain that I don't have anything to wear! It doesn't help that being pregnant now is an extra excuse to go out and buy new clothes to wear so that I look like the in-trend, cool mum-to-be..but it's getting easier now. I have decided that until and unless I really clear out all my cupboard space and go through each item of clothing that I have, I am not allowed to even think of buying new clothes!

This is not including 3 storage boxes and a suit case full of clothes that I can't wear now because I am pregnant! 

My next challenge would be Christmas and the upcoming Chinese New Year! I love the bright and shiny colours of Christmas clothing and it just feels so festive donning something new. But I know that I really have too much clothing and the clutter in our bedroom is really starting to irk me...even me...the untidy and messy person that I am. I just have to continually remind myself that my clothes-buying-ban for the rest of this year 2015 is going to help me achieve two things, learning to spend money on things that really matter (clothes is certainly not one of them, when I consider how much clothes I have!) and being intentional about living in a different way from before. In the beginning of the year, my first post was about being intentional. And now two months to the end of the year, I am still learning so much about this.


Track Our Family Expenses Monthly

I use the Spending Tracker App on my Samsung S5 as my phone goes everywhere with me and it is really easy to do the entries as and when we spend money. The Frugalwoods  recommend Personal Capital but I haven't had the chance to explore it yet and I have a feeling that it is more relevant to the US than Malaysia. One thing though, while Hubby is in agreement that we can and should live more prudently and frugally during these uncertain times, he finds it tedious to record every cent he spends. So it is up to me to ask him via whatsapp everyday or collate everything at the end of the day when we get home. There some interesting reader suggestions that Mrs Frugalwoods shared a few days ago, so I will take whatever I can get. I am grateful that at least Hubby agrees that we should track our monthly spending, be more prudent and frugal in our spending. That's a start isn't it? Hubby is not really a "spendy pants" kind of a person, but I know that he really values convenience over anything else. For example, he would rather spend RM 2 for a bottle of mineral water than fill one of the many water bottles that we have at home to take with him when he goes to work, or when we go shopping at Aeon, and he realised that he left his Aeon member card in the car, he would rather pay the RM 1 parking charges than walk back to the car to look for it so that he can enjoy the free parking! :) Men...you just gotta love them! So I am going to give it time because at the end of the day our goals are the same! I started tracking our monthly expenses in October unfortunately my S5 was corrupted and I had to do a factory reset and all my data was lost. Needless to say that I will ensure the same thing doesn't happen again.


De-Clutter Our Home

Starting with my clothes, Hubby has also gotten rid of our sofa and giant 50 inch tv that doesn't work properly anymore. It was a gift from my Dad when we first moved in. On top of that we also cleaned out the spare room and it is now a play room cum family area that we can hang out in together and enjoy the air con within the confines of the room, rather than turn on the 2 HP air con in the living area. The great thing is, our living area is now one big empty space with the exception of our dining area. Our plans are to turn one half of our living area into a play area for kids complete with a set of children's play slide and climber, a kid friendly enclosure for children in general so that we can have friends and their kids over to our home. It is going to be a lot of fun and a lot of hard work. But it is a project that we both feel is going to be so awesome for Chapati and Baby #2 (and who knows...baby #...) and friends. Having said that, I hope that we are not exchanging one type of clutter for another so we have to be really careful about how we go about this. Will share with you our journey as we go along but first things first, we are going to clear up this area this week!

Here is to new beginnings and a clutter free home!

Do you have tips and ideas on de-cluttering? How do you organise all the things that you accumulate in your home over the years?