My 2021 Goals

Happy New Year everyone. I pray that 2021 will be a much better year for everyone.

My year ended & started with death. We had 4 close friends & extended family deaths in under 3 weeks. Then first thing yesterday, my BFF of 35 years texted me to say she has Covid. Her whole family now has Covid. Her mom died of it on December 30th. I was so shocked by her mom's death, I was numb the entire day. We've been a big part of each other's families and have been through so much together. I'm praying & checking up on them daily. 

I'm calling 2021 The Year to Save

Many of my goals fell flat last year, but I'm looking forward to starting this year on the right foot.

* Reduce our grocery budget

Our weekly grocery budget was $120 (this includes food, HBA & cleaning products). After building up a nice stockpile, I realised that we no longer needed to spend as much on groceries. I'm lowering the budget to $75 p/w. I know this is doable. During Christmas week I only spent $5.95 at Aldi for onions, spinach and bread. The week after, I spent about the same amount on bread, onions & bananas. So I know that we can definitely do the $75. If we can spend less, even better. After all, the less we spend the more we can save. This will save us $2340 for the year

* Earn at least $1000 in gift cards

Earnings didn't do too well last year. Due to the pandemic, point earning sites had less sponsors which resulted in lower earnings. In a good year, I can earn at least $1200 minimum, so hoping that I can earn some decent rewards this year.

All Mypoints gcs will be for Kohls (well it's one of the least expensive gcs on their site. I don't know why their gcs don't all cost the same amount of points like Swagbucks. They are the same company after all)

$500 Kohls gcs will go towards BF sale. I might not need as much, since I hardly bought much during last year's BF sale. 

The rest of my gcs will be redeemed for Walmart & Target. The Walmart ones will be used for Sams grocery shopping. I will use the gc then take the same amount out of the grocery budget and save it for Christmas. 

All Ibotta gcs will be used for Sams grocery shopping, so I will just order Walmart ones.  I can use the Walmart gc at both stores.  

 

Save all Rakuten checks towards Christmas shopping. 

* $0 Clothes & shoes budget

This is something I've done for years. I've always used earned gcs and income from selling our old clothes, to pay for new clothes/shoes/accessories.

We have absolutely no need for new things, other than undies for DH (he wears a certain pricey brand only) and a few new tshirts. I didn't buy any new tees for him last year, so he's due for some new ones.

The only thing I need is new sports bras. I don't need anything else (maybe some athletic shoes since I didn't get any at the Kohls BF sale). I will write more about our clothing stockpile in another post.

My goal is to pull at least 5 items from my closet & 2 from DS's to sell every single month. We have way too much, so why not turn it into cash? I don't have any plans for the money yet (we have gcs to use if a need arises), so it will probably just go towards savings. 

 

* Continue saving change and small bills

I didn't save much last year, since I used my CC most of the time. When stores started accepting cash again, I was using lots of my coins and small bills to help with the coin shortage. I've also used much of my smaller bills for Marketplace purchases.  So I've just rolled last years savings into this year. There really wasn't much 

$20 - $5 bills

$38 - $1 bills

A considerable amount of coins though, but not enough for me to want to cash in at Coinstar. I'm gonna have to wear gloves when i do decide to cash out. 

* Save $10 per week for Secret Santa

2 Years ago, I joined my friend with doing the Secret Santa adoption. Her friend runs this program with churches in their county. Last year I decided to adopt an extra child, because I knew that there was a bigger need due to the pandemic. My friend then told me that many kids (escpecially older ones) don't get adopted. So I've decided to look for deep clearance items year round that they can use for fillers for those kids who don't get adopted. Those who read my previous blog, know that I can score new name brand clothing for next to nothing. My focus is gonna be on bigger kids. I also want to try and score inexpensive coats for them, because it gets really cold here. I already have 2 makeup gift sets that I picked up at RA a few weeks ago. The cost was $1.74 each after rewards, but I used points to pay for it so it was free. 

 

* Try to curb food waste

I've done quite a bit of freezer cooking during December. Not only are we eating less junk (saving money), but it helps us use up ingredients that would otherwise just go to waste. So far we're doing pretty well. We've done a great job of eating down the freezer.

* Continue couponing hard

I actually did pretty well with this last year. I hit all 3 drugstores and saved a bundle. I sold quite a few of those items that helped us recoup some of the OOP. 

I really need to focus on tracking how much I've saved with coupons and also my drugstore OOP. Sometimes I spend so little that it's not worth writing down, but I'm determined to see just how much it's helping us this year. 

 

* Try to do better with growing produce

Y'all know the tale of how us Michiganders couldn't purchase any seeds or gardening supplies during lockdown. Well, this resulted in late harvests and poor crops. I still have some leftover seeds, so I'm gonna plant real early this year. We love eating our own produce. 

* Work more

Ugh, this is a toughie, because I actually need a vacation.While everyone was decluttering and cleaning house during lockdown, I was working hard. Not complaining, because it was really nice to earn so well during that time. It was kinda weird seeing some empty storage shelves in my office, but that just meant more money in my pocket. However, working more equals earning more. And since I'm in saving mode, that means if I earn more, I can save more. I do still need that vacation though, but I'm gonna try to put in a certain amount of hours per day. 

* Max my IRA by April

This depends on stimulus checks. Right now unemployment rates are still high. Even though I had a decent 4th quarter, it wasn't nearly as good as other years. So if people get bigger stimulus checks or we can get that vaccine administered faster & open up the country again, then I can earn more. I might not be able to max it by April, but I sure am gonna try my best. 

* Take a vacation. 

This depends on the pandemic. If it's safe to go on vacation sometime this year, I'd like to do that. I told DH that if I can just get to lay on the beach all day long and do nothing,  I'll be the happiest woman on earth. I need a break. 2020 was crazy busy for me. I was so overwhelmed and stressed most of the time,  that I wasn't sleeping well. I'd go to bed late and be up by 5 am (without an alarm clock) . I decided to take Boxing Day off. I slept late and just spent a lazy day at home. That's exactly what I needed, because I felt much better the next day. I didn't even bother to buy any after Christmas clearance, because we needed nothing. 

That's about it for me.