One of the biggest reasons for creating MommyLuvs2save was to create a community of moms and dads who want to help their family save money when buying essentials in order to free up money for debt repayment. My own family has paid off over $111,500 in consumer debt including credit cards, student loan debt and 2 vehicles. I am a teacher at heart. I want to use the skills that I have learned to help YOU ditch debt. I want to encourage each of you in your efforts so that one day you can feel the freedom of being debt free. I’m not quite there yet either (we still have a mortgage) so I need encouragement as well
It can be very difficult to pay down debt. There are many temptations to spend money. We live in a culture that encourages debt and spending. In addition, expenses come up and there never seems to be any extra money for paying down debt. I want to urge each of you to participate in a challenge. Just leave a comment about one positive step you’ve taken for your family each day. Did you eat in instead of going out? Did you save money at the grocery store? Did you pay extra on your credit card? Leave a comment below and we will cheer one another on every day and every step of the way.
The challenge is to leave a comment about what YOU have done to work on getting debt free each day. One winner will be chosen to win a $50 Amazon gift card at the end of each month. To participate in the challenge you must comment on at least 10 posts during the month.
* I will also be sharing my progress from the day prior.
My Progress: Awww, we picked up our little friend yesterday (see below). I think Olivia never thought the time would come. We got him at around 3:30. We decided to name him Rudy. Ro’s middle name is Rudolph and he always wanted a dog named Rudy, so Rudy it is. We couldn’t believe how much he had grown in one week. He is 8 weeks old today. The girls had so much fun with him until bedtime. We went out for 1/2 hour to introduce him to his crate and he wasn’t a big fan. Hopefully he’ll get better with time. I bought him a $4 little dog bed last week, thinking he’d fit in it for a month or so. Can you see in the picture below how he’s almost too big for it already? My neighbor across the street brought me a bigger one for him, so that was a nice savings.
Our neighbor across the street brought us over a homemade nut roll. He got it from one of his clients and he doesn’t like nuts. It was a nice treat. All meals were eaten at home. We almost went out for lunch, but decided to stay at home instead. The girl’s piano teacher couldn’t make it for their lesson on Thursday, so I went to the bank yesterday and put the $25 we would have spent on the lesson in the emergency fund.
We got the title for the van in the mail yesterday – woo hoo. It came pretty fast. We also got a letter from Toyota Financial saying that it is paid off. It’s official, we are debt free except for the mortgage. I think Ro was more excited than I was 
All things considered, it was a great day !
What did you do? Leave a comment We’d love to hear about it You could make 2013 your year. Who will the February winner be ? We’ll see…
Rudy is so cute! I like his name, too. I’m sure Ro feels very honored to have his new “son” named after him! Yesterday was a no spend day. I earned 90 swagbucks and requested 2 $5 Amazon gift cards. Prayed for the finances of all ML2S readers.
That is so special that Ro sort of got to pick the name, and that it holds a special meaning. Yesterday we did go out for lunch but the entire bill plus tip was put on a gift card. Other than that, no money spent.
Cute puppy and love the name. The movie “Rudy” is one of my fans.
Got the food for Super Bowl, took my daughter to a party.. the gift from the stockpile and free samples. All meals at home.
We are back to a normal winter, its warmed up to about 40 degrees. ( Those single digit temps lasted 6 weeks!!)
Selling a ton of stuff on ebay, piled more for March garage sale. Going thru house deciding what furniture to sell, since “new” house is half the size.
Went to the grocery store yesterday. Spent $50 which is our weekly budget. Other then that there was no money spent out of pocket!
Rudy is so cute!! I bet the girls are having a blast playing with him. Yesterday was a mild spend day. My hubby had to pick up parts to fix items around the house, so that was a savings in my book b/c it needed done and I didn’t have to pay someone else to come here to repair them. I need to go to the store, so maybe I will do that today since the snow has slowed down now. Gathering items to sell on EBAY and another local site.
Rudy is precious! Worked a few extra hours yesterday. Submitting financial aid info for tuition today. Stocked up on .67 boxes of Capri suns at Kroger. Added points to coke rewards.
Rudy is absolutely adorable. He reminds me of my Sugar. Takes lots of pics now because if you think your girls grow fast, this puppy will astound you and you really won’t be able to remember when he was that small.
Yesterday I stocked up on some dollar store items that I can’t get any cheaper elsewhere. I applied for 2 jobs on Craigslist (which may have been scam listings, but it’s so hard to tell sometimes-they seemed legit, but now they are nowhere to be found). Unemployment has run out and coming to end of emergency fund so its getting to be yikes time.
Such a cute puppy. I paid off my last debt except for my house this past week. Wow! What a great feeling!!
I am SO happy for you. What a weight off of your shoulders. What’s your plan now ? Build up the savings or pay down the mortgage ?
Congrats
Rebecca that’s amazing!!
Woo Hoo! Way To Go Rebecca.
Sweet puppy! Place I adopted cat from clipped her nails for me and said to bring her anytime! Don’t have to pay for that now! Coke rewards today too.
No spend and will be eating at a Super Bowl party that we are bringing chili to—made from stuff already at home so no extra money spent on that.
Our heating bill was extraordinary this month due to some broken piping that had just been installed. I took the bill to the heating company to show them what their carelessness had caused and the owner wrote me a check for the entire bill—including what we would normally have spent because he wanted to compensate us for our trouble. (Paid to use a small local business because a mega store installer would not have done that!) So, we had no heating bill for our coldest month so far.
No spend day!!!!! The in law took us out to eat and buy the boys some clothes. Now that was a treat. Hoping for a no spend day today. At mom and dad’s for the super bowl. Well I don’t care about the game just the finger foods. Have a great day.
I’ve been lax in keeping up with you all. I had a pretty good end of the month and we spent a fair amount on friday grocery shopping, then yesterday DH didn’t come home for dinner so I treated C to pizza hut and it was nice but I probably should have just come home. We are heading to get our taxes done today I’m hoping for a good refund to do a few things with including pay down debt and bulk up our emergency fund. This year will be our 3rd anniversary and we have not gone out yet because we had a baby the first year then we were oot for a wedding last year (which i considered our anniversary trip) but this year I want to go away with just DH and spend a night together not worrying about our son, so I’m taking a little tiny bit out of the taxes we get back to cover that. There will be no spending on the CC to accomplish that.
Congrats to you all for paying off the van! We are super close to paying off the last of my hubby’s student loans. I’ve been doubling our payments so that we can be done by this Dec.
Rudy is adorable! We’ve debated getting a dog since I think it would be wonderful for our son who has special needs, but I honestly can’t get over the extra cost a dog would be each month. Maybe after this year when the last of the student loans is done. Something to look forward too!
Hubby stopped and picked up Hot Dogs and Baked Beans for dinner and that was only OOP expense today. Finished posting all my receipts into my monthing log, now I just have to put in the DR budget to see how we did. I sold two more things on craigslist for $60 so that goes straight to emergency fund. We did our taxes and we are getting a refund and that too will go straight to our emergency fund. It feels good to know we have a resource should something happen. Karen your new “little boy” is precious. I hope the girls help you with him. I know Ro is a proud Dad. Karen will you share your Chicken Fajita recipe for the crock pot please. Thanks
Rudy is too cute-love the name!