31 Days

It's been 31 days since I started my no scrap spending challenge to myself.

Literally the only money I've spent was $0.68 on a piece of patterned paper for a birth announcement for Katie's friend Ali. (I didn't have any monkey paper in my stash! LOL)

I've even managed to avoid buying cardstock, and I've still got one more Dot Roller refill left that I haven't opened yet! I've been to TWO all day crops and I've resisted the lure of the goodness.

I've stocked the store with brand new stuff… Maya Road, Jenni Bowlin, Reminisce… lots of gorgeous stuff and I've managed to buy none of it!

I've also made an interesting observation… as the time passes, it gets easier to resist buying. At the beginning of this challenge, I had made exceptions for two things; KI lace cardstock and Love, Elsie's Zoe line.

Both of those things are shipping *this* week! Instead of being so excited that it's coming in, I'm rethinking my choices… I think I'm going to skip the lace cardstock (I don't need $2 per sheet paper!) and get a little more Zoe. Zoe's patterned papers and embellies will go further and get me more “bang” for my buck, KWIM?

I have realized one little snag in my plan; I want to make a lot of Christmas gifts this year, but it's hard with only thing supplies I have on hand. I will probably need to spend a *bit* of money to buy things to make gifts. But that spending can really go under the “Christmas” part of the budget, as opposed to the “Hobby” category, KWIM?

I'm trying to come up with ideas that maximize things I already have, but I don't really have a significant stash of things to alter or decorate for gifts, so I may have no choice but to make a few purchases.

I've got some specific ideas at this point, but I can't really share them on here because the potential recipients **coughMomandKatiecough** are some of the most regular readers of my blog! LOL

So that's the updats, 1/3 of the way through the challenge!