Let me tell you about my budgeting spreadsheet

A Google spreadsheet is much more manageable.

My obsession with budgeting has been fairly well established by this point. But! I’m always making new discoveries, increasing my budgeting accuracy, and trying to find new ways to save.

In an effort to have a much better understanding of how I am spending my Mad Money, a few months ago I reincarnated my budgeting spreadsheet. I’m really keen on having such a minutely detailed record of my spending - firstly, it tickles my lizard brain and secondly, I now have an answer when I ask myself two days before payday: where the hell did all my money go this week?

In fact, keeping such a spreadsheet enables me to tell you that for the period 12-26 November I spent:

• 24.21% of my spending money on food
• 9.51% on coffee
• 10.31% on booze
• 38.50% on clothes (An anomaly. I must have been feeling rich.)
• 1.46% on homeware
• 13.14% on presents or donations.

I made my spreadsheet on Google Docs so that I can make updates on my phone in real time. No collecting receipts! I can make my entry on the spreadsheet between ordering and receiving my morning coffee - so no excuses for not keeping the spreadsheet up to date. (Of course, I’ve been horrible at keeping it over the fortnight before Christmas. But I am back on that bandwagon and feeling smug. Aw yeah.)

Because I am quelle generous, I have made a shared version of my budget spreadsheet that you can download and keep. The cells that are highlighted in yellow are for you to plug in your own information - there’s a space for the date and a space for the amount of money you’ve allowed yourself per fortnight. You are of course welcome to make any changes you like to your version of the spreadsheet - mine has some pretty specific categories and the pay period might not suit you.

Another recent budgeting triumph

I have some regular appointments that were annoyingly skewing my budget and leaving me broke at unfortunate times. So in November I worked out how much I spend every two months on all the appointments, and then how much I would need to put away each fortnight to cover them.

I opened another bank account for the Appointments money - and I set up a function that automatically sweeps any money over $300 straight into my savings account. It’s like magic! Magic savings.

The whole thing has been going swimmingly. Best idea ever.

It seemed like a good idea but didn’t really pan out that way

I had a plan to reward myself for not buying coffee by putting that money into my savings account every day that I bravely and maturely made the decision not to splurge.

However, this never really happened. It was a good idea though - and, at any rate, it would show in a very real and visceral way how much I could be saving if I wasn't frittering my money away on coffee. You should try it and let me know how it goes.

Spend less, save more: eating your income

Lately I've been committed to recording my weekly spend, and one thing has become painfully obvious - I eat or drink most of my money. Between grabbing a coffee and a scone on the way to work, and buying my lunch or dinner, I spend about a third of my mad money on food each pay period.

Food is good and food is important, and it's important to buy food and eat it. At home we put aside a good amount of money each week to buy food for the house and we eat really well - something for which I’m always grateful.

What I'm trying to address here is the additional money I spend on food each week, which is nearly always frittered away on snacks and food that I don’t really need. I want to avoid that feeling three days before pay day when I realise that I have have three dollars of spending money left and nothing really to show for it - not even a super fun night out. And I want to help you avoid it too. We can do it together!

So, while acknowledging that food is my one weakness, here are some suggestions - some of which I follow on a semi-regular basis, and that maybe you could follow more frequently - to stop us eating our money.

Fancy coffee is a treat

While cutting the coffee will not kill debt in itself, making a decision to drink less fancy coffee can make a difference to the amount you can save or repay. It's terrifying to think how much money I must have spent on coffee over the years. As an individual I'm sure that I've effectively propped up the entire Wellington coffee industry*, or at any rate, drunk the equivalent of a house deposit.

These days I try to make sure that I always have the makings of delicious coffee at work. If you're working for a more generous employer than I am, you'll probably already have some kind of coffee banging around the staffroom. But even if you're bringing in your own bag of fresh roasted beans, making coffee - rather than buying it - makes for a substantial saving.

Because being completely puritanical about espresso doesn't work for me, I get a coffee from a cafe once or twice a week. My work-local has a surcharge for takeaway coffee cups which encourages me to remember my Keep Cup, and thus, save the planet as well as 30 cents a pop. The upshot of this is that if I have to go back to the office to get my cup, I will stop - think about the coffee I already have available - and choose not to buy the espresso. At least, that’s the theory.

Better still, I use the infrequency of bought coffees as an excuse to take some time out and have a sit down before work or at lunch time. Not only do I get the caffeine, but also the atmosphere, the comfy seats, the access to glossy magazines, and the people watching. More bang for my buck, and makes it a treat rather than a habit.

Bring the basics

Keep the basics in your bag: fill a water bottle, bring a piece of fruit and a small container filled with nuts or some other kind of sustaining treat. We’re just aiming to make it from lunchtime to when we get home without blowing ten dollars on afternoon tea or buying a drink that we don’t need.

I’ve just started making Bliss Balls which are crazy delicious, but in the past I’ve also made muesli slice or biscuits that I take to work as an afternoon treat. Dried fruit and nuts or bought muesli bars are easier to keep on hand, and something that’s kind of fun if not actively completely macrobiotic is a small container of sprouts - I’m really into sprouting at the moment and sprouts are crunchy and delicious, so, win.

A moment too, to appreciate how annoying it is to buy a bottle of water - creating waste and paying far too much money for something you can get for free? Ugh.

Leftovers and freezer food

Three bean chili, rice and accoutrements

The big daily spend on food is buying lunches during the work week. I love sandwiches, but it can get boring when you’re bringing cheese and bread everyday.** I try and remember to bring a big container of leftovers, and keeping this in mind can dictate what I’ll cook at home - we eat much more bowl food and things that heat up and travel well.

I try to allow for days where there are no leftovers available by making a slow cooker pot of dal or chill beans once every fortnight or so, dividing the food into lunch size portions, and freezing these. In winter, soup is a good option - I used to work with someone who’d make soup with leftover veges (i.e. whatever was left over from last week) and then freeze the soup in resealable bags.

The problem with this plan is that you need to be fairly organised, and if you’re having a super busy weekend it’s just not going to happen. But I find cooking really relaxing, so I’m happy to prep and potter on a lazy Sunday.

These are the slow cooker recipes that I’ve used lately

• Smitten Kitchen: three-bean chili
• Cafe Johnsonia: Slow Cooker Red Lentil Dal

These Budget Bytes home-made frozen burritos and quesadillas also make good, simple lunches to keep in the freezer.

Dinner out is a social exercise

In another attempt to control my spending, I’m trying to make any dinners and lunches in cafes and restaurants social exercises. I get to enjoy both delicious food and delicious company!

Once again, the plan is to move away from considering expensive pre-prepared food a necessity and towards thinking about eating-out as an event on which it’s worthwhile to spend my money. That is, I want the experience to be one I savour and that is memorable. Not too much to ask?

Spending less on food is an ongoing project for me - do you have any suggestions to help?
Also, here is a 2010 post about the same thing: Money and the fine art of Not Frittering It Away on Food.

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*Only a tiny bit of hyperbole. Really.
**This is a lie. Cheese and bread are two of my main food groups, and I can happily eat variations on them every day. For the purposes of this blog post, however, let’s pretend that it can get boring.
***I really love doing this.

The money archives: money and Other People

Miss Smith and Dolls. Emily Smith (1901-1980), daughter of New York. Gov Al Smith, circa 1919-21. George Grantham Bain Collection.

While you’re sorting your financial shit out, it’s invaluable to talk to other people about how they manage their budgets and savings. When I first started revising my money situation, learning about other people’s money management helped me to keep focussed on my own debt recovery and savings. And I’m still not bored of it - to this day, personal money management and savings techniques are things that I really enjoy reading, and talking, and telling about.

During the early days of the Debt Unicorn (2010!), I did an investigative blogging series which included talking to people who always seemed to be good at managing their money. “Good at managing” meaning that they could afford to buy a coffee the day before payday, or travel overseas on the smell of an oily rag - things that at that time seemed to me to be beautiful, impossible dreams.

While all three of the people I spoke to are now in different financial situations, I'm reposting those interviews in order to inspire and ponder.

• Lizzie (in her post-grad student days)
• Lake (in his Urban Tramper days)
• Natalie (in her mature-student days)

 And, you can also read an interview with me from last year, about my money habits, now that your appetite is whetted.

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Brief life note

Notice how I didn’t talk about the election? That’s because I’m so fucking gutted.

In happier, if more frivolous news: this weekend I cooked beef cheeks for the first time and they were great! Strongly recommended. I’m quite looking forward to have another go, maybe I will cook this Cuisine recipe for chilli & tomato beef cheeks.

Spend less, save more: you still need to buy stuff

The previous post in this more-than-infrequent series covered working out how much you spend each pay period and what you were spending it on, and making a spending plan. In this post I’ll look at how to stay within your allocated week's spend, some things I found helpful in breaking the impulse buying habit, and ways to better plan your spending.

Buying stuff is fun to do

It can be hard to stick to your budget, especially if you’re used to the thrill of the impulse buy. The plan is to ultimately get the same thrill from saving or paying back debt. Or failing that, that you get a kind of puritanical thrill from your self-control. (YOU HAVE SO MUCH SELF CONTROL, look at you, walking around wielding it like a sword of light.)

The best way to slow or stop over spending if you’re an impulse buyer is to stop putting yourself in situations where you’ll spend. Tell yourself: you have no reason to be in a place where the main purpose is to buy things if you have no money with which to buy anything. For the time being, act as though you can’t be trusted in these temples to consumerism and just avoid the hell out of them. If you have someone who enables overspending (*cough* Mum, Lizzie) avoid going into shops with those people especially.  

This precept goes for op-shopping too. Whatever you’re going to buy may be cheap, but you still if you are spending outside of your budget, you can't afford it.

If, like me, you spend far too much time on the internet, you'll see many pretty shiny things in the world. It is natural to want such things. Instead of actively buying them, why not play a slightly masochistic game of ‘online window shopping’, by filling your basket and then shutting down the browser altogether. This will demonstrate your immense self control and give you the thrill of budget control. Try laughing defiantly while you do this ("ha HA!”).

Perhaps you like looking at nice pottery, or furniture, or beautiful vintage fashions? Can I recommend museums and art galleries as an alternative to shopping? Looking at collections of vintage clothes and crockery in museums and galleries gives me much the same feeling as looking in a shop full of nice second-hand clothes and furniture, but completely removes the risk that I might buy anything - provided I avoid the gift shop.

To the left is a particularly fabulous basket chair I saw at the V&A when I was in London last year. It’s beautiful and amaze and a museum piece. No budgets were harmed in the viewing of this covetable item.

Write it down and walk away

For better or for worse, you’ll never be able to avoid buying things entirely. A few years after my initial decision to buy less stuff I had to deal with the hard reality of this - things wear out, things break, and some of these things are expensive to replace - I’m looking at you, shoes.

The plan is to work out what is a necessity and what is a nice to have - I have a list on Evernote that I update on a regular basis along with the estimated costs of what I 'need' and what I 'want'. Things often appear on my 'need' list and then waft over to 'want' during the course of a week or month. ‘Needs' are bought first, ‘wants' often never - because wanting things can be so fleeting.

I found the best way to break my impulse buying habit was, if I saw something covetable, to write it down and walk away for an hour or so. If it was still vitally important that I buy those shoes, or that bag, or whatever, then I came back. I often find that after the initial flush of discovery has died away, the item in question isn't worth the walk back to the shop.

Op shopping is a different matter. Of course, walking away is always an option - leaving the ownership of a particularly delicious item of tat up to chance. But truth be told, I find that if I'm walking around a shop and holding an item in my hand for any length of time, I suddenly decide that my desire for aforementioned item was nought but a whimsy, and back on the shelf it goes.

Buy once, buy well

If you’re going to the trouble of making mature, responsible spending decisions, you might as well buy something that’s of good quality. Stop buying things because they’re the closest approximation of what you really want, and take the time to research, price compare and weigh-up quality.

The platonic ideal is to buy only top quality goods, with the assumption that they'll last forever. Like me, this might not be an ideal that you can afford most of the time. That’s totally fine. But decide in advance (your need/want list will help) what features you want the item to have, and if you can’t find something that fits the most basic of those requirements, don’t be afraid to go without.

Can I also say that saving up for something and then buying it outright is kind of an amazing feeling. Recently, Shannon and I saved up and bought ourselves a brand-new bed and futon mattress. We knew how much we needed to save for the bed on top of what we are already saving for houses and we saved it! It felt as though it took an age - but lying on that bed is like lying on a beautiful firm cloud of smugness and financial responsibility. TRY IT.

You could also consider whether the thing you want is something you could easily pick up second hand. For example, about five years ago I decided I needed black Doc Marten boots, found a pair on Trade Me for I think $50 max, and they have lasted me forever. They saw me around England, Berlin and Paris and I have never regretted buying them.

Share tips with me on my favourite subject! I have a million more - you can try also reading some posts from 2010 where I talk about wallet feng shui and clawing my way back on to the wagon.

In my next post: food is delicious, I am spending all my money on food. Help.

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Brief life update

Have I already mentioned that I’ve been feeling quite fragile lately? Because, guys, honestly I have. I am working on it though. It’s tiring.

I also want to take a moment to briefly discuss two recent baking disasters.

The first featured an apricot cake that I attempted to take as a dessert to a friends’ house - the oven switched itself off (as it’s wont to do during periods of extreme haste) and so I was already running late/in a panic. When I tested the cake with my trusty skewer it defo seemed cooked. However, apparently not, which I discovered to my utter chagrin at the moment of truth (i.e. when I attempted to cut a piece and the centre oozed. Cake centres should not ooze). 

The second baking disaster involved a carrot cake I made on Saturday as a late birthday cake for Shannon, and again, I tested the cake with a skewer and everything seemed hunky dory. This time I had iced the cake and we’d sat down with a cup of tea before the oozy centre of the cake was revealed. I wanted to (╯'□')╯︵ ┻━┻

Today I successfully made some muffins tho, so maybe I am winning now. LOOKING GOOD.

REPOST: Spend less, save more: making a spending plan

This post was originally published in June 2013, the first in an intended series about money and spending. I still have those posts in draft, and I fully intend to publish them. Thus, this repost serves as a refresher.

Back in 2010, I started paying back my debt with a vengeance and it became a pretty substantial blog project for me. I wrote up a bunch of interviews with people who I thought dealt with money well (Nat, Lizzie, Lake) and a series of posts about how I was dealing creatively with not spending so much. I think 'money' is probably one of the most used tags on this blog.

While I'm not blogging about it as much, spending less money and being out of debt/saving myself some dollars is still very much part of what I do on a day to day basis (witness: savings tower). I am nauseatingly proud of this and should not be engaged in conversation on this topic. Just ask anyone.

Having refined my savingsy/frugally ways over the years, and boring the pants off of everyone I know, I thought it was timely to revisit some of the most helpful things I've found to do to spend less and save more. I hope that someone else finds this useful - I know that in the beginning stages, reading blog posts about people in the same situation as myself was incredibly helpful and kept me on the straight and narrow.

I'd initially planned this as a single blog post, but realised that I had so much that I'd learnt and wanted to share into the ether that it made more sense to make it a series.

Thus, the first logical step:

Get your foundations sorted: work out a budget.

The concept of budgeting has such a stink of deprivation around it that most people are disinclined to look into their budget until they're absolutely at the end of their financial tether. I know I was.

Because I'm now saving, rather than paying off debt, it's something I rather enjoy these days (how horribly smug of me). I like to think about it as my spending plan, rather than my budget.

The questions you're trying to answer with your budget are: Where is my money going? How much do I owe? How much do I want to save?

1. Where is it going?

It's super hard to work out a budget without knowing how you're spending your money already.

There are a couple of ways that you can collect data about what you're spending your money on. The most straightforward way is to collect receipts and enter your daily spend into a notebook or spreadsheet, categorising each transaction as you go. Alternatively, you can use some kind of software or app that will pull information from your bank account and put it into categories based on your definitions (you can use something like Kiwibank's Heaps or, if you have access to it, Mint). I've used both the receipt and electronic methods - and sometimes a combination of the two.

Even once your budget is sorted it's good to keep an eye on your spending, as it helps to see how you're tracking against your budget and if you need to work more on the plan that you've nominated. It's not always easy to keep up, but it is worthwhile.

At this point, you can also rationalise your spending. Work out what outgoings are fixed: bills, rent, food, transport costs. I don't do this now, but I used to include my ration for coffee in my weekly fixed costs (they now sit under 'fun'). It's up to you whether you want to do this, but be aware that it will affect any capacity for saving or paying back debt and sometimes considerably. For example, I drink soy flatwhites which cost $4.50 each a day. If I budget for my daily coffee, then I am budgeting for $31.50 each week or $63 a fortnight. Or $126 a month. (Eep). I'd rather spend that on my trip to Europe, thanks awfully!

2. How much do I owe?

Since you're looking carefully at your bank account and spending, you should also work out how much you owe - add together ALL your debts, even the little amounts.

Calculating your debt seems crazy scary, but finding out the worst is better than being hazy on your debts. I've found the reality is rarely a friendly number, but it's a matter of 'better the devil you know' when it comes to debt.

When I first worked out how much I owed, it was truly the first step in having a sense of ownership of my finances. It was also a rather large number.

3. How much do you want to save/at what rate do you want to pay off your debts?

You can work out the rest of your budget - what you'll save, how you'll pay off your debt, and what you can spend for fun - from this point.

I've been trying to save or pay back my debt at around $400-500 pw, so I'll nominate that amount to go into my savings and look at whatever is left over for fun money. If I didn't have an aim in mind, I don't think I would be saving at such a steep rate.

I believe you should be paying off your debt before you begin to save, as saving money at the same time as paying off debt is self-defeating. Interest rates on credit cards and overdrafts are really high and unless your savings are in something like a term deposit, the interest you're earning on your savings won't make up for the interest you're paying on your debts. I know that there are arguments to the contrary, but I'm yet to see a convincing one!

Lately I've been keeping aside around $200 for fun money - 'fun' includes things like haircuts, coffees, social evenings, clothing and knitting/sewing stuff. I also try to make it cover medical expenses, although it's nice to know the savings are there to cover in a pinch. If I know I have a big expense coming up, I'll adjust my other expenditure accordingly. For example, I'm planning to get my haircut this week and pick up a pair of boots from the repairer - so eating lunch and dinner out is off the agenda.

I know from past experience that I can have a totally acceptable social life on around $100 a week - and I'm planning to scale back to something closer to this for the next few weeks of saving before my trip. It's nice to know what my absolute minimum limit for fun spending is (while having a not-hermit existence), and that I can scale back to this at any time.

I was reading the comments on a Stuff article about budgeting a few weeks ago, and the general tenor seemed to be: "that advice is all very well, but not buying coffee doesn't save me much money or fix my immediate debt problem". The point is, you can't fix your debt immediately, it must be done incrementally. And the true cost of debt is time.

Finally, it's important to remember that budgets aren't static! Some weeks are simply more expensive than others, while others allow for more money to be put aside (I saved heaps when I was glangey). Be honest about what you're spending and re-examine your budget on a regular basis. It's basically a hobby of mine.

I will never get bored with talking about money, and how to save it. Do you have anything super helpful about budgets that I haven't covered here?

Next time: Cheers for all that. So, how the hell do I stick to this budget?

Spend less, save more: making a spending plan.

Back in 2010, I started paying back my debt with a vengeance and it became a pretty substantial blog project for me. I wrote up a bunch of interviews with people who I thought dealt with money well (Nat, Lizzie, Lake) and a series of posts about how I was dealing creatively with not spending so much. I think 'money' is probably one of the most used tags on this blog.

While I'm not blogging about it as much, spending less money and being out of debt/saving myself some dollars is still very much part of what I do on a day to day basis (witness: savings tower). I am nauseatingly proud of this and should not be engaged in conversation on this topic. Just ask anyone.

Having refined my savingsy/frugally ways over the years, and boring the pants off of everyone I know, I thought it was timely to revisit some of the most helpful things I've found to do to spend less and save more. I hope that someone else finds this useful - I know that in the beginning stages, reading blog posts about people in the same situation as myself was incredibly helpful and kept me on the straight and narrow.

I'd initially planned this as a single blog post, but realised that I had so much that I'd learnt and wanted to share into the ether that it made more sense to make it a series.

Thus, the first logical step:

Get your foundations sorted: work out a budget.

The concept of budgeting has such a stink of deprivation around it that most people are disinclined to look into their budget until they're absolutely at the end of their financial tether. I know I was.

Because I'm now saving, rather than paying off debt, it's something I rather enjoy these days (how horribly smug of me). I like to think about it as my spending plan, rather than my budget.

The questions you're trying to answer with your budget are: Where is my money going? How much do I owe? How much do I want to save?

1. Where is it going?

It's super hard to work out a budget without knowing how you're spending your money already.

There are a couple of ways that you can collect data about what you're spending your money on. The most straightforward way is to collect receipts and enter your daily spend into a notebook or spreadsheet, categorising each transaction as you go. Alternatively, you can use some kind of software or app that will pull information from your bank account and put it into categories based on your definitions (you can use something like Kiwibank's Heaps or, if you have access to it, Mint). I've used both the receipt and electronic methods - and sometimes a combination of the two.

Even once your budget is sorted it's good to keep an eye on your spending, as it helps to see how you're tracking against your budget and if you need to work more on the plan that you've nominated. It's not always easy to keep up, but it is worthwhile.

At this point, you can also rationalise your spending. Work out what outgoings are fixed: bills, rent, food, transport costs. I don't do this now, but I used to include my ration for coffee in my weekly fixed costs (they now sit under 'fun'). It's up to you whether you want to do this, but be aware that it will affect any capacity for saving or paying back debt and sometimes considerably. For example, I drink soy flatwhites which cost $4.50 each a day. If I budget for my daily coffee, then I am budgeting for $31.50 each week or $63 a fortnight. Or $126 a month. (Eep). I'd rather spend that on my trip to Europe, thanks awfully!

2. How much do I owe?

Since you're looking carefully at your bank account and spending, you should also work out how much you owe - add together ALL your debts, even the little amounts.

Calculating your debt seems crazy scary, but finding out the worst is better than being hazy on your debts. I've found the reality is rarely a friendly number, but it's a matter of 'better the devil you know' when it comes to debt.

When I first worked out how much I owed, it was truly the first step in having a sense of ownership of my finances. It was also a rather large number.

3. How much do you want to save/at what rate do you want to pay off your debts?

You can work out the rest of your budget - what you'll save, how you'll pay off your debt, and what you can spend for fun - from this point.

I've been trying to save or pay back my debt at around $400-500 pw, so I'll nominate that amount to go into my savings and look at whatever is left over for fun money. If I didn't have an aim in mind, I don't think I would be saving at such a steep rate.

I believe you should be paying off your debt before you begin to save, as saving money at the same time as paying off debt is self-defeating. Interest rates on credit cards and overdrafts are really high and unless your savings are in something like a term deposit, the interest you're earning on your savings won't make up for the interest you're paying on your debts. I know that there are arguments to the contrary, but I'm yet to see a convincing one!

Lately I've been keeping aside around $200 for fun money - 'fun' includes things like haircuts, coffees, social evenings, clothing and knitting/sewing stuff. I also try to make it cover medical expenses, although it's nice to know the savings are there to cover in a pinch. If I know I have a big expense coming up, I'll adjust my other expenditure accordingly. For example, I'm planning to get my haircut this week and pick up a pair of boots from the repairer - so eating lunch and dinner out is off the agenda.

I know from past experience that I can have a totally acceptable social life on around $100 a week - and I'm planning to scale back to something closer to this for the next few weeks of saving before my trip. It's nice to know what my absolute minimum limit for fun spending is (while having a not-hermit existence), and that I can scale back to this at any time.

I was reading the comments on a Stuff article about budgeting a few weeks ago, and the general tenor seemed to be: "that advice is all very well, but not buying coffee doesn't save me much money or fix my immediate debt problem". The point is, you can't fix your debt immediately, it must be done incrementally. And the true cost of debt is time.

Finally, it's important to remember that budgets aren't static! Some weeks are simply more expensive than others, while others allow for more money to be put aside (I saved heaps when I was glangey). Be honest about what you're spending and re-examine your budget on a regular basis. It's basically a hobby of mine.

I will never get bored with talking about money, and how to save it. Do you have anything super helpful about budgets that I haven't covered here?

Next time: Cheers for all that. So, how the hell do I stick to this budget?

In which I begin to fill in another novelty-shaped money-thermometer

Hey so, I think I mentioned that I'd written a bunch of draft stuff that I hadn't got around to publishing.
On my 31st birthday I began writing a totes navel-gazing post:
Today is my 31st birthday (I wrote)

A year ago I decided that 30 was going to be the most amazing year ever - which hasn't necessarily been true. It's been deeply challenging and difficult, and I've had to make some decisions that were very hard for me. On the other hand, it's also been a year where I've paid off my debts, set up a gorgeous house with my partner, participated in kapa haka for the first time, and improved my sewing markedly.
This year I have a couple of goals:
✚ Travel to Paris, Berlin, London

 ... and then I stopped writing. Possibly my train arrived.
But it gives me the opportunity to introduce the Savings Tower! Now that I have paid of my debt, I am indeed most excited that I am saving money for myself instead of paying off debts.
The first thing I am saving for is a trip to Europe. Finally, after spending forever reading about Paris and Berlin and the UK and vaguely planning to *one day* (wistful dreaming face) travel there - I am DOING it. I am, of course, disappointed that hanging out at Shakespeare & Co won't be as exciting as it would have been, say, seventy years ago, or that I won't have the opportunity to run into Anais Nin and Henry Miller.* Or indeed visit a Weimar-era cabaret darlink.
In celebration of my new-found saving abilities I have created another novelty-shaped thermometer. Let us watch it grow together! As you can see I'm already trucking along quite nicely towards the cost of my airfare.



It's super nice to be saving for something lovely instead of throwing money at debt. Nobody ever told me how nice it would be to have assets... sometimes I just login to my bank account to look at my positive balance. Does that make me sound like Scrooge McDuck in his money pit?

*That would, of course, be truly ghastly and dreadful. That was 21 year old Sarah speaking, apols.
Currently playing: Howard by Dent May & His Magnificent Ukulele

This February, I...

 

✙ Took two weeks off work - and spent a week of that lazing about at home and enjoying myself with no pressure to go anywhere or do anything.

✙ Ate a crapload of summer fruit especially peaches, plums, apricots. Golden Queen peaches look terrible but taste amazing.

✙ Spent ten days in Golden Bay, my spiritual home, and became almost obscenely relaxed. I swam in the sea everyday and mostly stopped washing otherwise: it was heavenly.

✙ While in Golden Bay I went on an overnight kayaking trip and had a near death experience.  On the afternoon of the first day, the wind and the swell picked up and the waves became so much bigger than I am confident with - the waves were breaking over the front of the kayak and I FREAKED OUT. When we arrived at our destination I recovered with half a bottle of wine while shaking from shock; but now I can't remember the fear and only how amazing the trip back was on the second day. I Overcame my Fear? Or at least Killed it with Wine?

✙ Drank a bottle of Bombay Sapphire gin.

✙ Took my measurements properly, re-sized a couple of patterns and sewed two skirts - one a-line and one pencil - and another Scout Tee. The a-line skirt is not that great, but the pencil one was a spectacular success I feel.

✙ Read a heap of books: Caesar's Women (Colleen McCullouch), The Snowman (Jo Nesbø), The Paris Wife (Paula McLain), Going Out (Scarlett Thomas), The Dante Club (Matthew Pearl), The Alchemist (Paulo Coelho), The Subtle Knite (Philip Pullman), and the truly ghastly and stupid A Discovery of Witches (Deborah Harkness).

✙ Went to my first knit-night at Holland Road Yarn, where I was given permission by a fellow knitter to frog my thrice-cast on sweater and to admit defeat. "The yarn doesn't want to be that top." THE RELIEF IS SO GREAT.

✙ Washed my face with honey in the morning, cleansed using the oil cleansing method at night, and moisturised with a hand blended oil that included the epically stinky neem oil. Pretty happy with the results - have no immediate plans to turn back.

✙ Cast on a pair of merino-possum socks that I am enjoying knitting very much. Not a fancy pattern, but I'm not feeling too fancy at the moment so it's suiting me well.

✙ Had a spectacular meal with a group of friends that I regularly dinner-party with, and brought devils on horseback as my offering.

✙ Was fitted for contact lenses for the first time in the twenty-three years that I've worn glasses. Turns out I can't see that well with the particular contact lens prescription that I have which is disappointing. I'm hoping that we can sort that out at the next appointment I have BUT: it's fun to be able to see so much when applying my make up.

✙ PAID OFF ALL MY DEBTS AND FILLED IN THE DEBT UNICORN ONCE AND FOREVER.

My best things for looking after my rosacea (or: all the food I put on my face)

Having some success with getting my skin sorted at the moment, which is grand. I've been dosing up on a bunch of supplements and oils that were recommended to me years ago in my brief and abortive naturopath experience in Melbourne, and I've found that they've genuinely made a difference to the frequency of flair-ups and how quickly my face heals. Recently, Nat asked me about this, and given that I've done some experimenting (and continue to) I will Share. So generous.

So, my routine for my face is as at present:

• Wash my face with Agg Tval Swedish Egg White soap, and periodically (i.e. when everything is hunky dory) a quick exfoliate with a diddy bit of baking soda
• Tone with apple cider vinegar (1 part ACV to 3 parts water)
• Moisturise with Weleda Almond Oil for sensitve skin
• And then put on some decidedly non-natural sunscreen, because I need sunscreen and I haven't found a good 'natural' one yet

In terms of supplements:

• Tbsp of ACV in water morning and night
• 3000mg fish oil
• Single capsule EPO
• And something called a "Hair and Nail" supplement, which contains magnesium and zinc - the zinc should help with healing
• DRINKING ALL THE WATER

image from Daily Muse who was my first ACV as toner reference. *thanks profusely*

But the main thing is to AVOID - I had a flair-up this weekend because of drinking too much, not drinking enough water and getting sunburnt. Sunburnt is the worst thing ever. The thing to note though is that I've managed to get things under control in a matter of days because of the supplements et al above.

If I could boil it all down I would say: take lots of fish oil and drink more water. You need to drink more water. Oh and also: think sensitive skin if you're buying or making ANYTHING to put on your face, not oily skin kill it with salicylic acid and lots and lots of astringency and exfoliation die die die. *ahem*

At the moment I am also thinking of trying some new stuff out. Specifically, I'm interested to see if the Oil Cleansing Method and neem oil will make a difference to my skin. I've ordered a bunch of stuff from Go Native who are based in Auckland and were very understanding about combining my postage when I made two separate orders on the same day. I've also been obsessively reading Crunchy Betty, and am now basking in my skin after washing with manuka honey. Yes this is ridiculously expensive, HOWEVER we're periodically given honey by Shannon's cousin who is a beekeeper (apiarist) so there is that. Although he's now working in bars in Singapore so perhaps I should mediate my smugness somewhat.

So I have questions, if you have answers: have you tried/love/hate either the OCM or the washing-your-face-with-honey business? Do you have any tried and true tips for the legions of silent rosacea sufferers in the world, but especially me?

Recent discoveries

via We Heart It

1. You cannot sharpen scissors with a knife sharpener, no matter how good the knife sharpener. Using the knife sharpener on the scissors will simply blunt them, making you increasingly frustrated as you hack at cloth with little to no effect.
2. Related: there are not very many knife sharpening services in the Wellington Region.
3. I still get a frisson of excitement every time I make a purchase - one that matches the frisson of excitement everytime I knock another $100 off my Debt Unicorn. While I wish the savings/debt paying back frisson was bigger than the other frisson, I am also not wishing my purchasing frisson into guilt because: Feeling Guilty Achieves Nothing.
4. When bored, I procrastinate terribly. This in turn leads to more boredom which leads to more procrastination, sending me into a procrastination spiral of awfulness.
5. It’s impossible to talk about Snakes on a Plane without swearing.
6. I am too too attached to the George RR Martin Song of Ice and Fire series. I’m on the last published book at the moment, am halfway through, and am already wondering how I will be able to stand the wait until the next book. The pain! The anticiPAtion!

Thoughts and links and thoughts

 

from La compagnie des dessins

An 84-Year-Old Sends Her First Text Message | The Hairpin

I read this today and I just LOVED it; an elderly woman making contact with her children and grandchildren on their own grounds, but most importantly, how much she enjoys learning how to use a new thing.

My Granddad is really into Skyping my brother Josh in Edinburgh. One time, Josh and his girlfriend Emma showed Granddad and Granddad's wife Dorothy all around their flat using Skype and my Granddad still talks about it.

 

 

I'm doing a free coaching online workshop type thing: The Reinvention Project. I don't know how much I'm likely to actively reinvent my life, but I'm hoping that it will steel me to be a bit more active, and a bit more proactive in paying back that credit card (also known as, the bane of my existence). I am SO stuck on those two things. With the financial thing especially, I feel as though I've been kidding myself: thinking that I am actively making progress while I take a lot of steps backwards by digging into the credit card constantly.

This started at the end of my school year. I've started talking about my finances a lot less, and I think it's because I know that I've been handling them kind of badly and don't really want to admit it to myself or other people. I've literally just realised that I've been avoiding talking about my financial situation because I'm feeling ashamed that I've been dealing with it so badly - and realising this makes me realise in turn that I have slipped off the bandwagon big time.

The Reinvention is working? Now all I need to do is to get enthused about exercise. Bicycle riding today was good.

 

Investigative Blogging: Finishing school, starting a new job

Next week, on Monday I start my new job. I am VERY excited about it for a number of reasons, ranging from: 'I love learning new stuff' to 'Fuck Yeah, a stepping stone to my Ideal Future'. However, one of the biggest reasons that I'm uber, sickeningly excited, is that I will have money for the first time in months and months and months.

What I want to do is have the world's largest splurge: throw my money around and buy all the shoes and electronics in the world. Summer shoes! Ebook readers! iPhones! Leather jandals! Possibly also I would buy some books and some audio books and some ebooks. Books books books.

However, what I will actually be doing is riding the Debt Unicorn again. Confession time: I have truly fallen off the Unicorn, and have had to increase my debt, telling myself all the time that as soon as I'm working again I'll be able to make some more serious payments. And I know that it's bad because I have tried not to tell anyone (read: the Boy, the SCP lovelies) about my debtiness.

So, what I'd like to do is try and get the credit card paid of in it's entirety by this time next year. In fact, I estimate that I should have it done within six months - but I need to be practical as well, especially as I am planning to make some changes to my living situation. So this is my declaration: that I will have paid of my credit card debt in it's entirety by the 16th of November 2012. I shall update the Unicorn regularly. I shall be honest with myself and others about my monetary situation.

Over my period of getting on top of my debt (and then backsliding) I've discovered how much I prefer to have a budget and know exactly how much I'm spending on a day to day basis. Whenever I backslide I get caught up in a sort of roller coaster ride of budgetary "not knowing" - that is, I kind of enjoy spending without any controls, but then I am struck with horrible fears and random money guilts. Yes, it can be a pain in the arse living within my means, but at least it's not freaking scary.

Currently playing in iTunes: City Girl by CSS

Fourteen Resolutions for Spring

I’m totally resolution-less at present since I ditched my "fifty-two things" list (which never made it to fifty-two things and which I spectacularly lost interest in). However Spring is Nigh, and spring is bringing with it the Urge to Resolve, and I can no longer fight it. It's time to make some arbitrary life changes.

I’ve made fourteen resolutions for spring. They’re mostly to do with decluttering parts of my life, taking better care of myself and keeping on top of my money situation. Decluttering because during the winter months my room seems to have become more cluttered and it’s small enough for even a slight increase in clutter to be overwhelming. Money because I have fallen off the wagon lately and I need to reassert control over my income and expenses. Modest my income may be, but it’s more than enough for me to live comfortably and have a proportionally modest social life - provided I manage it well.

In no particular order the resolutions are:

• Instigate a one-in one-out rule for my limited book shelf space 
• Return all my library items on time 
• Regularly clean my shoes, check which of them need re-soling, re-lacing or turfing and take any that need repairs made to the shoe repairer (I’ve had two pairs of summer shoes done recently so I’ve made a good start on this) 
• Have my coats dry cleaned and prepare them for summer storage 
• Wash my winter clothes and pack them up for summer storage 
• Sort through my winter clothes and get rid of anything I didn’t wear during the season 
• Turf the ratty undies
• Sell my roller skates (BAH, but it must be done. I haven’t been using them at all and I’m strapped for cash) 
• Get my bike-serviced, the crank arm fixed, and ride it everywhere 
• Restrict espresso coffee buying to Monday, Friday and one day in the weekend 
• Spend cash and stop using my debit card so freely 
• Stick to my budget 
• Be honest about how long it takes me to get ready in the morning and rework my morning schedule 
• Arrive at school on time

The rest of September, October and November look to be particularly smug months. Excellent.

Tell me if you have resolutions for the change of season?

Investigative Money: studying, and the fine art of living on next to nothing

My money situation has done nothing but improve since I've started studying. I think I've ranted before about how liberating the lack of money feels - my acute awareness of the lack of money means that I'm not overspending week by week, rather, counting (and accounting for) every cent. I've been very accurate with my budget, something I have been not that great at doing in the two or three months leading up to beginning study. And it feels absolutely fabulous. I really want to take this feeling of control with me into the post-study, post-debt stage of my life, and it's something I'm going to work really hard to maintain.

I could never have imagined myself saying this 18 months ago. Bizarre.

Truth be told, I've had a couple of great things that have happened that have further freed up my money situation, including the tax people being very understanding with my tax repayments (did I mention my $5000 of overdue taxes? No?). Basically, I had paid off about half of this debt and - be still my beating heart - have been "excused" from the remainder, due to hardship. That is: I rang the IRD to advise them that I would have to pay off the debt at a much lower rate per week, and they just wiped it entirely. When they rang me to tell me this, the phone had woken me up from an afternoon nap and I was absolutely convinced that I had dreamt it. I had to wait until a letter arrived before I could let myself believe. It felt like an enormous weight melting off my shoulders, dissolving into the ether, slip-sliding away ... Moral of this story: TALK to the IRD petals. TALK to the tax people. Do not run away from the Tax.

Would you like to see the Debt Unicorn?

Cunning things to notice: I am just over $1000 dollars still in debt. I'm paying off about $100 a month at the moment (down from $600) and just whittling away at it for the time being. I plan to pay off the rest in a couple of big chunks when I'm working again and then dance in my underwear for about three weeks non-stop.

Ok, so enough of the skiping already. Want to hear my top things for saving money at the moment?

• Taking a leaf out of Ange's book, I am giving myself "espresso days" and not drinking espresso coffee on any other days (unless, of course, I am given one as a treat from my Boy). So, at the moment, I'm only drinking espresso coffees on Monday, Friday and one day in the weekend. Sometimes on Monday I think "oh, I'll treat myself tomorrow instead", but my self imposed rule means that even if I shuffle my treats around I'm still limiting my treats, and given that the coffees are now like, $4 each, the limitation sure is something.
• On the rest of the days, I take my wee flask of coffee to school and drink it in the student common room. It's officially the geekiest mature student thing that I do.
• Having breakfast means that I'm not hungry during my morning break - I come home and eat something substantial for lunch, leftovers or poached eggs on toast. Lately we've had a lot of soup around. So, no buying food out, unless I'm going for dinner or some other kind of meal - and then it's a social event, which is another matter entirely.
• If I'm not drinking any coffee and coming home for lunch, and then working from home in the afternoon, I've found myself having "spend nothing" days almost inevitably.
• I'm back on the cash band wagon. I take out $100 dollars on pay day, knowing that it should be enough to last the week. And, so far it's been pretty good - I've even been able to put a little money in my savings account because there has been money in my spending account that I haven't even touched.
• I've been saving for things I want! I've thought out any big purchases I'm planning to make over the next six months or so and I know about when and about how much I'm going to have to stump up. Organisation with money is a strange and wonderful thing.
• I'm not allowing myself to owe people money. If I can't pay for it, I don't do it.
• I've purged yet more of my clothes, and have taken stock of my clothing situation. The only clothing I can imagine myself needing or wanting over the next year would be a pair of black pants (I imagine cigarette-style pants). I've taken in a bunch of my clothing to the Recycle Boutique so I should have a little money there to help me get a new pair.
• And finally - tiny luxuries make me happy. I'm trying to treat myself to something little and luxurious week by week, knowing that (like the coffee) it's a little treat to reward me for all my good work. At the moment I'm looking at my lovely little miniature roses and reflecting on how pretty, lovely, and cost efficient they are. 

I'm loving on my tiny, concise world at present. Of course, I'm pretty much a hermit. But, I love that as well so HEY HO.

Arohanui. FUN!

Rachel Sumpter via Lost at E Minor

Hope you are well my darlings! The weather is beginning to sloooooowly shift towards autumn here - there are some very "late summer" feelings in the air. I'm still managing to read outside, at least in the afternoons, but MY it is chilly in the shade.

Last night I read this item on Yes and Yes about the phrases "want to" and "have to"- that is, the power of using words to change your attitude through saying that one wants to do a thing, rather than that one has to do a thing. This is something that I talked to one of the therapists about one time, and it made me revisit a bunch of stuff that I wanted to do but had managed to append a "should" to - and how that "should" was holding me back! So here I am, again - because I WANT to write a delicious list of things that I am loving on at the moment. For realz, j'adore!

So, in no particular order:

♥ Free time! Between study and work I feel as though I have far more free time than I've had in a very.long.time. Maybe since I was at University? I keep telling myself that it's just a false impression but consider me very happy in my present delusion.

♥ New school supplies: The Boy took me shopping and between the beautiful pens, leather pencil case and Moleskine notebooks he bought me, and the new school bag and Thermos that I bought myself, I am officially the most satisfied and probably also the most stationery-geeky person in my class.

♥ My Boy is super awesome. And leaves me totes adorb notes about salads in the fridge. And yesterday he caught a crayfish!

♥ Living within my means and nailing my debts: I am so, so happy that this is all coming together! Somehow, the decision to live without very much (otherwise known as studying) has paid off in terms of getting me to live within my means. It's early days but so far but I'm really enjoying the idea that my income covers all the essentials that I need to pay for - and how that feeling encourages me to keep all my "wants" to the very bare minimum. Is this what minimalism feels like?

♥ Learning: I think my brain is getting fried due to learning at such a pace (it's suddenly picked up), but also - it's GREAT. When my mum went back to study she said the hardest thing was learning how to learn, and I thought I understood at the time. The reality is that it's a lot more complicated than I'd thought at that time - but I absolutely love learning, and I know that once I've warmed up and got the big old Thinking Muscle stretched out, I'll be totally good to go.

And that's me for this Thursday my darlinks. Please share something fabulous with me?

Investigative Blogging: How the Money is Going; including my Current Lack of Enthusiasm

via We Heart It

ight oh. So.

The money thing (i.e: getting on top of my finances, paying back my debts and living within my means) has been pottering along reasonably well. In saying that, I have been finding that my enthusiasm for the whole endeavor has been on the wane since just before Christmas. I guess that's the Christmas condition - it's hard to live within your means without masses of organisation and I just never really got around to getting organised, if you know what I mean. And that combined with the debt repayments meant that I spent a lot of the month juggling money and spending in very strange ways. In addition, January has been a struggle as the urge to spend has been really, really affecting me. Specifically I keep thinking: Buy it All now! There will be no money next month! Gah! Buy! Spend! Lipstick! Really ugly stockings!

I guess that the Answer is to take stock of the situation and try and reinforce some of the really good things I was doing earlier, things that had inspired me and enabled me to feel good about my self control (as oppose to bored and mildly depressed). I read over my little inspiration post that I wrote way back in September and I think the things I need to do are:

♥ Start spending only cash again so I can take stock of the money I'm actually spending. I was doing this for a long time, but at some point I slipped back into using my Eftpos (debit) card to pay for everything.

♥ Take up daily tracking of my spending money. I always intended to do this, but I never quite got around to actually doing it. This is exactly the kind of thing I need to be doing in order to take control of my spending again. I've printed out a little calendar already and it's all neatly filed away in my Filofax.

♥ Complete my Money and Other People series by interviewing my little brother. Talking to people about spending and money is the best way to keep me on track.

♥ Update the Unicorn regularly! Here he is in all his glory:

♥ Rub my little Buddha's belly. It makes me think about self-control and NOT SPENDING every morning, and that's a good thing.

♥ Keep a better track of exactly how much money I have at all times. There is nothing good about not knowing what's in the bank account.

♥ Drink espresso coffee once every two or three days (instead of everyday and sometimes even twice a day *looks around guiltily*).

Furthermore:

♥ I pledge (places hand on heart) to not buy any clothes until the end of my Six Items or Less Challenge. I shall not even cruise the op shops. I shall cross the road to avoid yarn shops. I will steadfastly avoid fabric shops.

Yes indeed, I shall be Little Miss "knows-where-her-pennies-are-at". Watch this space!

Wednesday List: Ten More Things in 2010 (An Exceptionally Long Round Up on How Far I Have Come)

id you know that October was a completely list free month? Fascinating. It's like, I completely lost my list-writing mojo. But darlings, it happens to all of us and we just need to take it as it comes. Sometimes, there just isn't the list making urge inside.


Anyway, you may remember that I made a list of things to achieve in 2010. And then another list, which is this list. I thought it must be time to reassess the situation, given that I haven't even looked at the list for a while and that the year is hurtling towards a close.


1. Spend two hours a week putting the photos back into the SCP blog archive, and otherwise generally tidy up the archive so it looks more consistent. Suffice to say, this is incredibly tedious and distressingly close to what I actually do at work, so I am finding it very difficult to get enthusiastic about cleaning up the blog.  I shall do some work on my Lady of Leisure week, which begins next Monday. I have been trying to fill things in as I go, so that's made a bit of a difference to the back catalogue. Overall, I give myself a "Must try harder".


2. Make my bed everyday. Ah. Must try harder, again.


3. Have at least one "Buy Nothing Day" a week. This I've been doing really well at! I'm also on a spending fast at the moment, which is kind of good (and has been giving me a bunch of excuses to get out of things that I don't really want to do). 


I love love love Buy Nothing Days. If you're new to the whole thing, why not try taking part in Buy Nothing Day which is November 27th? You've got heaps of time to aim for it! Read Thrifty Chick's post about it for a bunch of info.


4. Pay back $4000 of my credit card. Check out the Unicorn! Booyakasha! 

I don't know if I'm likely to get pay off $4000 before the end of this year, but I am making some adjustments to get my expenses which will probably bring me closer to the goal. Either way ($3000 or $4000), the Debt Unicorn makes me thrill every time I fill it in. Awesome. I kind of like hanging off filling it in for a while too, so I get an extra surge of excitement from filling in large chunks of the Unicorns torso. Tee hee.


5. Take part in the Six Items or Less Challenge. I'm holding out to know whether there is going to be a SIOL-organised Challenge before the end of the year, and I'm thinking the best bet will be just to nominate a start date for myself and stick to it. Thus, I nominate next Monday (first day of my Lady of Leisure week) as the first day of my own, personal, six items or less challenge. I'll follow it for four weeks (ending 22 December). Rock and roll! It's pretty exciting - anyone else keen to join me? Let me know if you are and we can be support buddies.


6. Spend a month identifying and wearing clothes I never wear, and decide whether they're keepers or biffers. I've been trying to wear things that I don't more often, and getting rid of them if I genuinely have no desire at all to wear them. I'm a bit hampered by the unpredictability of the Wellington spring but I feel that I'm doing pretty well. I have two more bags of stuff that I'm keen as a bean to get rid of and would generally give myself a B for this one. I don't think I ever really settled to the task.


In hindsight, I think it would be a good task to set oneself maybe once a week every two months - having a set week to wear clothes that don't normally get an airing seems like a pretty good idea to me.


7. Either use the hula hoop or get rid of it. Totally gone. Awesome.


8. Clean and maintain my crafty machines. The other day I oiled and cleaned my overlocker, and I think it made a difference, but I promptly broke a needle and packed up in disgust so I can't tell for sure. I know that my sewing machine has been operating a whole heap better since I gave it a good clean. My spinning has dropped off the radar a bit but never mind. I think I can safely say that I'm achieving at this task. I rulez, and am now striking it through. OH YEAH.


9. Get rid of the knitting machine and table in the garage. I need to chase up the person who is supposed to be taking this off my hands, wherever she is. I'll chase her up. With holding judgement on my achieviness on this task.


10. Eat my food more slowly. I'm definitely eating my toasted sandwiches at lunch time more slowly: this is mostly because I had a series of really bad tomato/cheese burns on my chin and it was bloody miserable to be constantly burning myself with my own lunch. I can safely say that I'm making more of an effort to eat my food slowly. I'm going to take a leaf out of my own book and be more mindful when I eat - think more about nourishment while I'm eating. It's harder to scoff your food when you're thinking about the process of eating it.


1a. Make a budget and stick to it. My budget is coming up for a pre-study reassessment. And believe it or not, I'm actually very excited about this. I am also surprised at my excitement? Anyways, my Savings Accoutn has not worked out so well, but I've always maintained that the Savings Account was really for rainy days more than anything (at least, it was while I was getting out of my mountains of debt). I also need to work out a budget for next year when I start studying! Weeeeeeeeeeeeeee STUDY!


2a. Unclutter my life and maintain a clutterless environment. In the weekend, I rearranged my room in the hope that I would be able to fit in a desk next year. I am super stoked with how well it's worked out, and I've managed to get rid of an entire piece of furniture. My bedroom is now a shrine to the Power of Getting Rid of Things That You Really Don't Need.


However: I read this very interesting item by Danielle La Porte on White Hot Truth and it rather resonated with me - especially the part where she quotes a woman called Lianne Raymond who notes that the recent obsessions with minimalism could be read as "pathologizing the feminine in favour of celebrating the masculine". This ties in some ideas I took with me from a book I read some time ago by Penny Sparke called As Long As It's Pink: The Sexual Politics of Taste. In this book, Sparke explores exactly this kind of idea in a historical context - namely the shift from Victorian parlours and knick knacks to Bauhaus et al, and the way that this shift reflected an effort to negate the overtly feminine in interior decorating.* And it made me think about decluttering as a sexual political act. 


I must confess I've never loved the idea of extreme minimalism, but I do like the idea of removing the things that are dragging me down - mentally and physically. In conclusion, I intend to think a great deal more about this but mostly sit on the fence with the doing, and also to reclaim my knick knacks that I really love. I'm not going to turf out my lovely teacups just because I don't drink tea out of every one! Organised collections people, organised collections.


And thus ends this round up for November! Congratulations if you made it this far. Contact me if you require a chocolate fish and one shall be forthcoming.




 *This is the briefest summary of these concepts ever, and they really are so much more interesting than this. If you're interested in this kind of thing (and it is really awfully interesting) then I strongly recommend you find the book and read it.